The KuronekoChan & the Shiroyasha Arc
by hijipine
Summary: Gintoki and Hijikata are kidnapped by an alien, have a lot of sex, fight a lot, and talk about contracts. Hijikata gets cat ears and a tail as well as girl-bits. Cliches run rampant, and there are pirates. Raunchy fun and adventure! GinHiji, HijiGin
1. Lesson 1: Black and White

**The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc**

**Author:** HijiPine (Samsarapine on LJ and AO3)

**Pairing:** Sakata Gintoki/Hijikata Toshiro

**Rating:** M

**Genre:** Action/Adventure, Humor, Romance

**Warnings:** Major cliché romping: 1) Hijikata Turned Into a Cat-Boy With Girl Bits (With Occasional Het-Sounding Sex, Though It Really Isn't, Since This is M/M); 2) Enforced Captivity Leading to Sex; 3) Main Characters Becoming Sex Workers To Survive; 4) Astronomically Improbable Coincidental Meeting That Leads to Rescue; 5) Shinsengumi Stalking Behavior; and 6) Other Various and Sundry Overused Plot Devices. Replete with Very Bad Language, violence (and some bloody/gory bits); raunchy humor; (edited) sex, genderbending and a smidgeon of character development to pull it all together and give it a tiny bit of credibility. Adult readers can find the unedited version at my LJ or AO3 accounts.

**Story Summary:** Gintoki and Hijikata are kidnapped by an alien, have a lot of sex, fight a lot, and talk about contracts. Hijikata gets cat ears and a tail as well as girl-bits. Cliches run rampant, and there are pirates. Raunchy fun and adventure for all!

**Disclaimer:** Sakata Gintoki, Hijikata Toshiro and all associated characters from the Gintama universe are the property of Sorachi Hideaki and those to whom he has licensed his creations. No copyright infringement is intended. The author is making no profit from this story.

**Author's notes:** Much love and deep thanks go to Kansouame, my amazing beta. Without her, this story would have been utter chaos. I've done some work on it since she last saw it, though, so any remaining mistakes are mine.

**Chapter Summary:** Lesson 1: In which Gintoki and Hijikata argue about food, atomize their meals, stop a terrorist attack and have the opportunity to name their asking price.

**The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc**

**Lesson 1: Black and White is Like Day and Night Except When You're in Space or Unconscious, When It's Pretty Much Just Black.**

A parfait wasn't a substitute for sex, but something about sinking a spoon deep into the melting spirals of rich cream and firm, rounded globes of vanilla and pulling it out, swirls of sweet chocolate syrup clinging to the cold metal surface before surrendering to a searching tongue, was pretty close to it, as far as Sakata Gintoki was concerned.

And it was permissible in public. He could be in the middle of a crowded restaurant (which he was) – surrounded by innocent women and children (well, probably not, innocence being rare these days) – in the presence of aliens (especially the noisy and lewd Amanto group two booths away) – and still indulge himself in the oral equivalent of jerking off.

Life didn't get much damned better. He pushed his spoon in and out a few times, enjoying his growing arousal. Damn. Sugar was just so sexy dressed as ice cream.

The stink of cigarettes gave him an instant's warning, but the sweet siren voice of the parfait had ruined his reaction time, and Hijikata Toshiro slid into the other side of the booth before Gintoki could do anything to discourage him from sitting there, like maim him or kick him in the balls.

"Oi, put that boner away before you poke someone's eye out, Yorozuya."

Gintoki scowled. "Like you know a boner when you see one, Shinsengumi. And sit somewhere else. I don't want people to think I know you."

"Every teenage boy knows what a boner is, for cripes sake. I'll have the usual," Hijikata added to the waitress. She bowed and fluttered her eyelashes as she left to place his order.

_She didn't do that for me_, Gintoki thought, though without the energy to be truly resentful. He figured it was the uniform, especially the tight trousers. Gintoki was a Bad Boy, but Hijikata was a Bad Boy in Tight Uniform Trousers. "If I wore tight uniform trousers, I'd get more girls than him," he muttered to himself.

"You say something?"

"No."

The parfait beckoned Gintoki with its sweet scents of cream and sugar and chocolate, and he felt his spirits rise again. At least parfaits weren't fickle. He could become one with a parfait and not have to worry about waking up next to some empty dessert glass with smeared lipstick and a peevish expression.

"Oi. What the hell are you doing here, anyway? I thought your boss was the only stalker in the Shinsengumi." Gintoki deliberately dipped his spoon into his parfait again and moved it up and down as blatantly as he could. He didn't bother to hide the evidence tenting the front of his black trousers. Fuck Hijikata anyway.

"Die, bastard." Hijikata accepted a bowl of something covered with a thick layer of mayonnaise from the waitress. He eyed the mound before pulling another bottle from his pocket.

Gintoki shuddered as Hijikata poured more mayonnaise over the bowl. "I hear that eating too much mayonnaise leads to impotence."

"Curly white hair means terminal stupidity." Tossing aside the empty bottle, Hijikata picked up the bowl. "Shut up and let me eat in peace."

"The only true peace is One Piece. You've got to be a monkey to find it."

"If you don't shut up, I'll kill you."

Gintoki didn't bother to reply because his parfait had reached the perfect hard/soft consistency and he didn't have time for assholes. He savored another spoonful and bliss flooded his soul. Parfaits. No, women didn't have a thing on them—

Something shattered the window beside him and landed in his parfait glass. He blinked at it in outraged incredulity. "Someone just threw something into my parfait! My _perfect_ parfait!"

Funny. It looked like a bomb.

00:06…00:05…00:04…00:03…

He swallowed hard and tossed it to Hijikata. "It's for you."

The bomb landed in Hijikata's meal. Gintoki dove to the floor.

Hijikata's eyes widened and he ducked just before the blast rocked the little restaurant. Wood splinters and shards of glass flew through the air amidst screams and droplets of mayonnaise.

"You blew up my ramen, you son of a bitch!" Coughing, Hijikata whipped out his sword. "I'll kill you!"

"They were after you, you bastard! You owe me a parfait!" Gintoki pulled out his wooden sword and crouched in readiness. He'd give the asshole mayonnaise—

His revenge fantasy was interrupted as a wave of armed men stormed through the ruined door of the restaurant.

"We're the Freedom Unit Committed to Killing Every Damned Useless Pan-galactic!" the first man shouted, waving a bazooka in the air. "Amanto Ambassador, prepare to die!"

A well-dressed three-eyed Amanto, seated at what remained of the lewd party's table, blinked. "I say, that's a bit harsh, isn't it? I mean, I don't believe we've even been properly introduced."

"Wait. You're FUCKEDUP?" Gintoki couldn't believe the stupidity of the name. Zura must have had something to do with it. "You named yourselves FUCKEDUP?"

"Shut up or I'll kill you, too!" The leader said, brandishing his bazooka with a flourish. He turned back to the Amanto. "Die, you Amanto son of a bitch!"

The Amanto looked hurt. "At least get to know me before you make death threats against my life—"

"I said, _shut up_!"

"I told you we needed a better name—" one of the terrorists stage-whispered.

"Shut UP! We _voted_!"

"Of course, once people get to know me, death threats are fairly standard fare—"

"JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP!" The man turned the bazooka on the Amanto table. "Die, you crazy-ass invading alien bastard!"

A bazooka might be all well and good for killing Amanto under most circumstances, but there were the aforementioned innocent women and children in the remains of the shattered restaurant to think about, even if their innocence only existed in theory.

Gintoki leapt forward.

Hijikata was right beside him. "You're all fucking under arrest, you crazy fanatic bastards!"

Gintoki swung his sword like a baseball bat. The bazooka shattered under the impact, and the lead terrorist flew through the air and crashed through the remains of the door that had once led to the kitchen. Hijikata sent the remainder of the terrorists scurrying as he charged into them, his sword flying and darting like a snake.

Within moments, all of them had been subdued or had surrendered, the leader cursing furiously as Hijikata put the cuffs on him and dragged him back to where the others groaned in pain or sat dejectedly, cuffed to the bar rail.

"…Fucking shit-nosed…"

"Shut up, loser," Hijikata said.

"…ass-kissing, traitorous…"

"You're getting on my nerves, asshole."

"…Shinsengumi bastards—"

There was a _thunk_, then silence.

Hijikata kicked the terrorist to make sure that the butt of his sword had done its job. "Damned right you're FUCKEDUP."

"My restaurant! You blew up my restaurant!" The man was fat and bald and his face was covered with sweat, snot, and tears. Gintoki really, really hoped he wasn't the cook.

"It wasn't my fault this time." Hijikata wiped his blade and returned it to its sheath. "Call Shinsengumi headquarters and have them send someone down to pick these idiots up."

The restaurant owner stared at him. "Don't you have a police radio or something?"

Hijikata grabbed him by the front of his shirt. "Just call the fucking Shinsengumi, will you? Tell 'em it's for Vice-Commander Hijikata." He released the trembling man.

"Y-yes, sir. R-right, sir." The owner backed away through the rubble towards the kitchen, where Gintoki presumed there was a phone, or maybe a convenient escape route, since everyone knew that Vice-Commander Hijikata was a psycho killer in a Shinsengumi uniform.

"Oi," Gintoki said, poking the unconscious leader's side and putting his sword away. "Pan-galactics? Isn't that copyright infringement?"

Hijikata made a disgusted sound. "It's become a common-use noun, you idiot."

"Really? Like kleenex?"

"More like hoover."

"But hoover's used as a verb."

"Die already."

A nasal voice cut their argument short. "I say! You two!"

Gintoki and Hijikata turned to the small crowd of customers who remained, mainly Amanto who were too stupid and arrogant to run away. The smarter customers had long since disappeared; nobody liked getting mixed up with the Shinsengumi.

The three-eyed ambassador beckoned to them. "You two! Wait! I wish to talk to you!"

"Unless it's about a reward or a job, I'm not interested," Gintoki said.

"I'm not interested, period." Hijikata glared at Gintoki.

"What? He's the one who asked you to wait, not me!" Gintoki protested.

The ambassador stumbled through the debris. "I say!" His three eyes gleamed and the light streaming through the dust cloud made his skin shimmer like gold. "You're quite attractive for monkeys, aren't you? Might you be samurai?"

"What the fuck?" Hijikata demanded. "Get out of my face! I'm a fucking officer of the Shisengumi, you freak!"

"You're the one who made all the crude sex comments, aren't you?" Gintoki looked at the Amanto with a tinge of admiration. "You've got a hell of a mouth on you."

"I quite like your package, too." The Amanto leered. "In fact, that's what I'd like to talk to you about."

Gintoki had a date with a fresh parfait and wasn't inclined to talk. Still… "Is there money in it?"

"Of course. Is there ever a time when money isn't in it?"

Gintoki imagined a really _big_ parfait. "Okay. I'll listen."

"It's your funeral," Hijikata muttered.

The Amanto laid a hand on Gintoki's arm. "Oh, yes. Quite nice and hard, aren't you?"

"Wait a second." Gintoki checked. "Nope. Not any more."

The Amanto beamed. "That can be remedied, I'm sure. Now, the two of you stand together. Come on, that's right," as he shivvied Gintoki next to Hijikata. "Oh, yes. Like a matched set, aren't you? Black and white and butch. And may I say, your _swords_ are truly _impressive_. Quite breathtaking. May I buy you?"

After blinking stupidly for a moment, Hijikata delivered a neat left cross to the ambassador's jaw and stepped over the Amanto's prone body. "Not for sale, asshole. And you stay the fuck away from me, Sakata," he added, pointing a finger at Gintoki. "You're fucking bad luck."

"I'm not the one who invited you to eat lunch with me. You barged in." Gintoki straightened his kimono and 'accidentally' kicked the ambassador in the balls. How dare he lump him together with Hijikata. Asshole. Gintoki was a million times sexier.

"The Shinsengumi are keeping an eye on you. You're a known associate of rebel groups—"

"Do you think I'm stupid? There's no way in hell I'd be associated with a group that calls itself FUCKEDUP." Hijikata looked like he was about to blow a gasket, which would be kind of fun to see, but Gintoki could hear sirens coming and there was no way he was going to stick around when the rest of the Shinsengumi jerks showed up. Fuck it. He needed to find some sweets to wash away the sorrow of his parfait's too-early-and-much-too-tragic demise. "Later, Stalker."

"Stop, you bastard! You're a witness to a terrorist attack—"

Gintoki ignored Hijikata and headed towards the empty space where the door to the restaurant had once been. The waitress, coughing and waving her hand in front of her face, stopped him. "Excuse me, sir. Your bill."

Gintoki looked at the slip of paper in disbelief. "A bomb went off in my parfait."

"I believe it actually went off in the Shinsengumi gentleman's ramen."

"After landing in my parfait!"

She frowned and grabbed Gintoki's collar. "I suppose that means you won't be leaving a tip," she said in a low, threatening voice.

"Just, just, just – okay, okay, give it here." Gintoki grabbed the paper from her and shoved it in his kimono before prying her hand away. "The tip is on the table." He dashed out the door before she could pound his few scant coins from his sugar-deprived grasp, leaving her staring at the splinters of booth he'd left behind.

The streets were empty – bombs and Hijikata had a tendency to make people scarce – and Gintoki managed to escape down an alley just as the Shinsengumi drove up. He slipped through a few cutbacks and shortcuts, just in case Hijikata sent someone to follow him, but it was just a precaution. Nobody showed up behind him, so he relaxed once he'd put a few streets between him and the remains of the restaurant.

Damned Shinsengumi. People like Hijikata could crap wherever and whenever they wanted to and other people had to clean up the shit they left behind or come out smelling bad. People had a right to lead shit-free lives. Hijikata wasn't bad to have in a fight, and he didn't back down when things got tough, but there was just no sense in the world at all when a guy like that got paid for blowing up restaurants and perfectly innocent ice cream parfaits.

Speaking of which, Gintoki needed a sugar fix. He paused and checked his wallet; it was as empty as he'd figured it would be. Remembering a sweets shop that sometimes was a little careless about collecting payment, he dodged into the next alley without looking.

A split second later, he realized he'd done a really stupid, stupid, thing. "Wait—!"

Something crashed down on his head, effectively silencing his protest.


	2. Lesson 2: Remember Your Passport

**Summary:** Lesson 2: In which Gintoki and Hijikata are kidnapped by a kinky alien who turns Hijikata into the ultimate sex toy, and Gintoki offers to help Hijikata lose his virginity. Subsequently, energy cannons are fired and Gintoki botches an ejection.

**The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc**

**Lesson 2: Remember to Carry Your Passport, Just in Case You Wake Up As Another Species.**

Gintoki's skull felt like one of Zura's bombs had gone off inside of it. He swore again and rubbed the bump on the back of his head. Waking up in a western bed after being ambushed in an alley wasn't the way he'd wanted to end his day. At least he wasn't alone: a bizarrely dressed Hijikata was asleep and drooling on the pillow next to him.

Not that his own outfit wasn't bizarre. Gintoki had pulled off the stupid little gold crown with the veil and had stripped off the bamboo chest armor, but he'd left the rest of the outfit on because it was cold in the room. Besides, the damned arm length black gloves that ended for no apparent reason at the ring around each middle finger felt sort of good against his skin, as did the clingy high-necked black silk shirt and the robes. And the weird thing that hung across his shoulders… was it toilet paper? Did monks carry their own toilet paper? Did they drape it across their shoulders and carry it around in public? Was it holy toilet paper? Would the gods be pissed at him for carrying holy toilet paper around his neck when he wasn't a monk? What would happen if he used holy toilet paper to wipe his ass after he'd taken a shit? Would he go to Hell?

_It's Hijikata's fault. Somehow he's got me all caught up in some kind of Shinsengumi revenge plot or something._ Gintoki shot Hijikata a look that he was pretty sure would slice the balls off the bastard if he'd been awake to see it.

In fact, there was no reason that Gintoki needed to be the only miserable person in the room. From the looks of it, he was pretty certain that Hijikata would be even more miserable than Gintoki was once he was awake, which would make his own misery a little brighter, if only in comparison.

"Your breath smells like sour mayonnaise," Gintoki muttered. He shook Hijikata's shoulder. "Oi! Neko-chan! Wake up!"

Hijikata made a sleepy noise. "Fuck off, Sougo."

An image of the sadistic Okita and Hijikata together in bed flitted through Gintoki's mind. He shivered. Hijikata was either an idiot or a masochist. "Wake up already! Hey! Neko-chan!"

"It's not Neko-chan, it's Katsu—Fuck." Hijikata rubbed his eyes. "It's catching. Wait a minute!" He bolted upright. "Where the hell are we? And why the hell are you in my bed?"

"Unless Shinsengumi get paid a whole hell of a lot more than I think they do, I don't think this is your bed. Oh, and yeah, by the way, you have cat ears."

"Cat ears!" Hijikata blinked and patted his head, all color receding from his face. "Holy shit!"

"They're cute," Gintoki admitted grudgingly, watching the soft, pointed ears twitch. "You've got a tail, too. I hear black goes with everything."

"A tail—" Hijikata whispered faintly.

A long, slim bump rose under the covers, but it wasn't anchored at the right place, so Gintoki didn't suffer any envy. Well, not much, anyway. He shook his head philosophically. "If a man lives long enough, there will be days like this."

Hijikata grabbed his collar. "THERE IS NO FUCKING DAY LIKE THIS IN A MAN'S LIFE!" he bawled into Gintoki's face.

"Don't go crazy on me, Neko-chan," Gintoki protested, his hands up.

"YOU'RE THE ONE SPOUTING INANE COMMENTS!" Hijikata let go of Gintoki's collar and looked around the room with a stunned expression. "Fuck. I never should have got out of bed this morning. I knew it was going to be a shit day as soon as I walked in on Kondo-san taking a dump before breakfast."

Gintoki pulled away.

"Not like that, idiot! He didn't lock the stall door, that's all."

Gintoki relaxed a little and scratched his stomach. "It looks like the door is the only way to get out." He got off the bed and started to walk towards it when he found himself sprawled on the floor under 150 pounds of angry cat-boy.

"STOP, YOU MORON!"

"I'm stopped!" Gintoki wheezed.

"The door is wired."

"Huh?"

"Just look at it, you idiot. It's wired. It's probably live." Hijikata squirmed on top of Gintoki. "Watch."

A pillow landed on the metal plate that covered the floor between Gintoki's nose and the door. It immediately began to quiver and dance, while Gintoki could feel the floor underneath him tremble in time to its gyrations.

The pillow exploded. Feathers floated down and the cycle began again.

"It's a giant vibrator," Gintoki said, awestruck.

"It's a giant vibrator that _makes things explode!_" Hijikata snapped.

"Just the feeling I'm getting from the floor is making my big guy happy," Gintoki said. He ground experimentally against the floor. Nice Things Happened, so he did it some more.

"Fucking pervert!" Hijikata abruptly got off him. "Fine. Kill yourself by giant machine sex if you want to. I'll let everyone know you were an idiot to the end." He stalked back to the bed and sat down, arms crossed.

Sighing regretfully, Gintoki got up and sat down beside him. "Maybe later. Oi. What's the last thing you remember?"

Hijikata didn't bother to ask what he meant. "I was heading back to headquarters after my shift," Hijikata muttered. "Someone jumped me."

Gintoki nodded. "Me too. Damn, I could use some chocolate right about now."

"Your teeth are going to rot out."

"Shut up, jerk." Gintoki looked around the room. "You sure this isn't your bedroom?"

"Do you want to die?"

"_Someone_ really perverted sleeps here."

The bed was huge, with a frame that would probably make Okita come in his trousers, given all of the manacles, chains and straps dangling ready for use. Mirrors lined the walls, harnesses dangled from the ceiling, and there were several pieces of furniture that Gintoki suspected had nothing to do with comfort and everything to do with pain. A large cabinet stretched to either side of the bed. Gintoki didn't think he'd ever seen so many varied and brightly colored sex toys in his life.

"As if we didn't know that already, idiot. So what the hell happened after that?"

Gintoki stuck a finger in his ear. "I woke up dressed like this and lying next to a freak." He grimaced, then took his finger out of his ear and examined it for a second before flicking it.

"At least I don't look like some S/M monk with toilet paper around his neck," Hijikata said, dark satisfaction in his voice. "I'm still in black. Damn, I could use a cigarette." He began absently patting himself for a pack, and suddenly froze, flushing a deep crimson.

"A black Cheongsam," Gintoki felt justified in pointing out. "Slit up to your navel. And the heels on those stilettos are at least six inches high. They look nice with those new boobs."

"Boobs! I've got boobs! What the fuck?" Hijikata groped his chest again, flushed an even deeper crimson and scrambled under the bed cover, pulling it up to his neck. "Don't look, you pervert!"

"It's not like you're naked. Though, if you want to be, that's okay, too." Gintoki wouldn't mind seeing Hijikata's boobs, actually. Though they were on the small side, they looked perky.

"Unless we find other clothes, I'm fine with what I'm wearing," Hijikata forced through clenched teeth.

"You're a man! With boobs! Wearing a sexy dress and stilettos! Gah!" Gintoki pulled his hair. "The first time in weeks I've woken up in bed with someone with breasts, and it's some kind of mutant policeman!"

"Years, more like."

"Oi! Catboy!"

"Pervy permed priest!"

"Bastard!"

"I'll kill you!"

"Bring it on!" Gintoki paused. "Wait, that's your line."

"Bring it on!"

Gintoki shook his head and sighed. "Our time slot is going to be bumped again. But it's no use crying over spilled milk, I suppose."

"Oi! Enough with the cat jokes!"

"If you say so, Neko-chan." Gintoki dodged Hijikata's punch. "Oi, time for fun and games later. We need to figure out if you've got any other little surprises waiting for you."

"Like what?" Hijikata glowered in an embarrassed way.

"Are the ears and tail and boobs the only things that they've changed?"

Hijikata got a panicked look on his face. His hand disappeared under the sheets. "Shit," he whispered, turning green. "I think I'm gonna be sick." He threw back the sheet and yanked his dress up. "Tell me that isn't what I think it is! Please! Tell me. Now!"

Gintoki stared. "Whoa. It's like a strip mall of sex," he breathed.

Hijikata dangled, limp yet pretty impressive for a guy who just found out he was a cat with girl boobs, but it wasn't Hijikata's joystick that drew Gintoki's eyes.

"Neko-chan, you've got a pussy."

Hijikata passed out.

"Oi!" Gintoki glanced at the door and decided it was better to have Hijikata around to face whatever it was that had done whatever it had done to Hijikata's body. He shook him. "Wake up!"

Hijikata blinked, his eyes dazed. "Kondo?"

"The gorilla isn't here. Are you going to be all right?"

"Fuck. I need a cigarette." Hijikata slowly sat up.

His tail hit Gintoki in the back of his head.

"Ouch! Watch it with that thing, jerk!"

A considering look crossed Hijikata's face and he turned to Gintoki. "Have you checked to see if you've still only got one set of plumbing?"

Gintoki's heart stopped. "Augh! Damn!" He hitched up his robes and felt his crotch. "Thank the gods of he-men everywhere," he breathed in relief, and slumped back on the bed.

"Natural old-man silver," Hijikata observed. "Or do you bleach?"

"Old man, my ass! I'm only a couple of years older than you!"

"Bullshit."

"I don't have an old man's ass!" Gintoki insisted. "Though if I did, it would still be a hell of a _fine_ old man's ass. But I don't. Look! Virile _young_ man's ass!"

"Get that fucking thing out of my face!"

"Hey," Gintoki said, dropping his robes back into place and settling in next to Hijikata again. "Looks like we're sex slaves, doesn't it? You know. The priest and the prostitute?"

"Someone tries to have sex with me, I'll rip him a new one," Hijikata muttered. "This is so damned clichéd." He closed his eyes; his color was starting to come back, Gintoki noticed.

He was actually kind of pretty, in a hard-assed Shinsengumi way. If he weren't Hijikata, Gintoki would have put the moves on him when they first woke up. Though…

Maybe they could help each other out. Little Gintoki was feeling frisky, despite their situation, probably because of the boobs and vibrator stuff he'd been exposed to. Judging by Hijikata's pointed nipples, he was feeling the heat, too.

"You're not trying very hard to escape," Gintoki pointed out.

"You aren't, either."

"But that's because I'm perverted. I've always wondered what it would be like to be a sex slave."

"You're nuts."

Gintoki shrugged. "So. Escape?"

"The door is the only way out of this room. We'd be vibro-splattered in little pieces before we got halfway to it."

Hijikata was right. Gintoki examined the heavy electrical cables that blossomed into a fine mesh of delicate wires across the burnished metal of the door. They seemed to make a design.

"Whoever kidnapped us sure has a thing for guys with cat ears," he observed.

"Shut up."

"No, really. If you tilt your head to the side, you can make out at least five Amanto doing it to a neko-guy—" Pain exploded through his jaw as a stiletto heel connected. Gintoki landed on his ass on the floor.

"I said, _shut the fuck up_!"

Gintoki waited for the stars to fade a bit. "Cranky without your nicotine, aren't you?"

"I'm not the one with the shakes from sugar-withdrawal."

Damn. He'd hoped that Hijikata wouldn't notice. "Maybe we need something to take our minds off of just sitting around and waiting to be violated."

"Like what?"

"I don't know," Gintoki shrugged casually and watched Hijikata's feet like a hawk. "Maybe we should start the party without the hosts?"

Hijikata slowly turned towards Gintoki, death radiating from every pore.

"Look at it this way," Gintoki said reasonably, still keeping his eyes on Hijikata's stilettos of pain. "Would you rather lose your virginity to me, or to a bunch of horny aliens with S/M fetishes?"

"I'm not a virgin."

"Shit!" Gintoki stared. "I'm sorry. Was it while I was unconscious or something?"

"Fuck." Hijikata took a deep breath. "No, you moron. I haven't been raped."

"Whoa! Then you did it voluntarily? Kinky! How are those guys built, anyway?"

"Bastard!" Gintoki ducked, but Hijikata's attack was half-hearted at best. Ha! So he was feeling it, too. Gintoki let Hijikata pin him to the bed.

"Shut up." Hijikata dropped his head to Gintoki's chest and muttered something.

"What?"

"I said, I'm not a virgin, but—"

"But what?"

"Technically, my – you know – is." Hijikata's ears were blazing red.

"Your euphemism for a cat?"

"Enough with the fucking cat jokes!" Hijikata kneed Gintoki in the groin and stood. "You're a fucking horny, perverted, manipulative son of a bitch, aren't you, Sakata?"

"Why, does that bother you or something?" Gintoki managed to gasp. Damn, his private bits were getting a workout, and not the good kind, either.

Hijikata snorted. "You remind me of Sougo."

"Bastard."

They both fell silent, Gintoki nursing his bruised jewels and Hijikata seemingly just being his normal sulky self. Gintoki groaned. They were so screwed, and the sex torture hadn't even started yet.

"We're screwed," Hijikata said.

"Wait! I was just thinking that!"

"Liar."

"No. Really. I was thinking, 'we're so screwed—'"

"—And the sex torture hasn't even started yet," Hijikata chorused with him.

"I hate that I'm thinking like you."

"I hate it more." Hijikata squirmed. "This damned tail itches."

"Where?"

"What do you mean, where?"

"At the tip? Along the whole length? Where it meets your ass?"

"The last one."

"Oh."

"Look away for a minute."

"You're paranoid, you know that? We're guys. You're just going to scratch your ass, aren't you?"

"Look, you jerk, just – look at the dirty mural on the door or something."

"I've been trying my best to ignore it."

"Then close your eyes."

"For a minute?"

"A long minute."

Gintoki sighed and closed his eyes.

"You're not looking, right?"

"I'm not looking. I bet you wear a towel in hot springs, don't you?"

"That's rude."

"So's scratching your ass."

"You said you weren't going to look!"

"I'm not, I'm not." Gintoki squinted, trying to make his eyes look like they were closed. He watched as Hijikata jacked up his skirt around his hips and looked at himself in the mirror. Damn. That was really hot. And when Hijikata's hand moved to the base of his sleek, black tail…

"Oi!" Gintoki said hoarsely. He cleared his throat. "Ass scratched yet?"

Hijikata dropped his dress. "You can open your eyes now."

"I don't even know why the hell I had to close them in the first place," Gintoki muttered. "Look. There aren't many options open, are there? We can try to escape and get vibrated to death, we can kill each other and conserve electricity, we can lay here on the bed and talk about boring shit like the fact that I didn't get my _Shonen Jump_ today, since I'm stuck here with cat-boy—"

"Oi!"

"Or we could have sex."

"You're the last person I'd ever want to have sex with."

"You're not my first choice, either, but I might be the last person you could ever _choose_ to have sex with," Gintoki pointed out.

"Fuck."

"We can do that."

"I didn't mean—fuck."

"Make up your mind, would you?"

"…"

Gintoki yawned and rolled over. "Then there's the last option. We can just go to sleep."

"…If we do this…"

"Do what?"

"…You know."

"Sleep?"

"HAVE SEX, YOU BASTARD!"

"Sounds good to me." Gintoki rolled and twisted, and an instant later, he was lying on top of Hijikata. "It's been a while. Do you mind if we do it the old-fashioned way, with the guy on top?"

"Get the fuck _off_ me!" Hijikata heaved under Gintoki, and both men gasped as their hard lengths came into contact.

Gintoki was pleased to discover that Hijikata was just as turned on as he was. "Feels like you like me just where I am." Gintoki buried his face in Hijikata's neck. "Mm. You don't smell bad for a guy."

Hijikata shoved him away. "Strip. I'm not having sex with a fucking priest."

Gintoki took the toilet paper from around his neck and put it on the bedside table so they could grab it easily when it was time to clean up, then obligingly stripped. As he started to peel the black gloves down his arms, Hijikata cleared his throat. "You can leave those on," he said gruffly.

Gintoki narrowed his eyes. "You're stripping, too. And if I leave the gloves on, you leave the stilettos on."

Hijikata glowered, but he reached for the buttons at his throat and slipped the first one through the loop that secured his dress closed. Gintoki sat back and watched with admiration as Hijikata finished unbuttoning his dress and pulled it over his head. Garters. No bra. No panties. Gintoki approved entirely. As soon as Hijikata's head emerged from the cloth, Gintoki pushed him down and straddled him again.

"Those are damned perky," Gintoki observed, staring at Hijikata's boobs. "You're almost as sexy as an ice cream parfait."

"Shut up!" Gintoki erpped in surprise as Hijikata grabbed him by the back of his neck and yanked him down into a savage kiss. Hijikata's breath might smell like sour mayonnaise, but his tongue tasted smoky and hot and moved with a wicked sinuousness that Gintoki really, really wished he'd known about before, because Hijikata was definitely worth kissing and it was a shame that they hadn't started doing it years ago.

Hijikata's tail thumped Gintoki's ear.

"Ouch! Shit! You made me bite my tongue!"

"Grab it," Hijikata ordered, pressing forward.

The tail thumped Gintoki again. "That thing should be registered as a deadly weapon!" Gintoki snapped, rubbing his streaming eye and hoping it wouldn't swell up like a monkey's ass.

"I said 'grab it,'" Hijikata hissed. "I can't control the damned thing."

"Right." Gintoki grabbed.

Hijikata gasped. "I meant that you should grab the fucking _tail_!"

Gintoki moved his thumb a bit.

"I guess it's all right," Hijikata muttered when he could speak again.

Emboldened, Gintoki slid his hand lower. An instant later, he was lying on his back on the floor, rubbing his jaw and staring at the ceiling. "The writers are really getting a kick out of the whole 'hit Gintoki with the tail' thing, aren't they?"

"Shit. I told you I can't control it."

"Do me a favor. Kill the aliens with it, not me." He struggled to his elbows and looked up at Hijikata's glowering face. "I don't think I'm in the mood any more."

"You'd damn well better be, because that hand of yours isn't done yet." Hijikata grabbed Gintoki's hair and yanked him off the floor.

"Owowowowowowowo – Oh, shit!"

Hijikata Did Something Really Sexy.

"Okay, I'm in the mood again," Gintoki panted. "Oh hot damn, am I in the mood!"

Hijikata hesitated. "You have any protection?"

"What?"

"Rubbers. Sheaths. Condoms."

"Why?"

Hijikata just stared at him. An image of little Hijikatas running around with swords and diapers full of mayonnaise flitted through Gintoki's mind.

"Oh." Gintoki could almost feel sorry for Hijikata, if he weren't such a bastard that he deserved to be made into a mutant. But sex. The first sex he'd had in a long, long, _long_ time. Hijikata was _almost_ a girl, and 'almost' counted pretty big when you hadn't had any in a while. "Don't worry. I got great marks in sex education. I know what I'm doing."

"Condom or nothing. I'm not getting pregnant with a bunch of naturally-permed white-haired brats on sugar highs rolling around inside me!"

Whoa. Suddenly little Gintokis were running around with the little Hijikatas, and, cute as they were, Gintoki drew the line at litter births. He dove into the cupboard next to the bed and started pulling out drawers. He hit pay dirt in the third one: inside were dozens of varieties of condoms and flavoured lubes. "Ooo! Chocolate-flavored extra-large ultra-thin-manly-ribbed!" He ripped the packet open.

"Don't eat them, you idiot!"

Gintoki took the condom out of his mouth. "I just needed a taste, that's all."

"Put it on or choke on it!"

"Right, right. Oof!" Gintoki found himself suddenly on his back, a very determined-looking Hijikata leaning over him. "Hey, wait! Wasn't I supposed to be on top?"

Hijikata straddled him. "You think I'm gonna get pinned down by your heavy-ass body?"

"Gosh, you're pretty testy. Time of the month is it?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Moon madness? Crimson tide? The unwelcome visitor—"

"I'm not on the fucking rag! Now shut up and do something constructive for a change."

"All right," Gintoki said. He grabbed Hijikata by the hips. "Slide onto the glory stick, Neko-chan."

He didn't see Hijikata's fist, but his jaw exploded with pain. By the time the stars stopped flashing in his eyes, Gintoki's lower body had settled into a healthy rhythm, however, probably proving something about the unnecessary nature of his higher functions, which he would cheerfully throw away if he could do what they were doing forever, or at least for a hell of a long time.

Hijikata was disturbingly gorgeous. Way too much man for any woman, or any other guy… Gintoki's eyes glazed over at the thought of watching Hijikata getting it on with some chick, preferably in a threesome involving Gintoki. "You're too sexy," he muttered, clutching Hijikata's waist.

Hijikata moaned and clutched his knees tight around Gintoki's waist, arching as a girl-bits climax seemed to hit him. A moment later, his boy-bits gave an encore performance. Gintoki lost his rhythm and simply plunged in as deep as he could, reaching his own heights of ecstasy.

Hijikata collapsed on top of him.

Gintoki caught his breath, waiting for Hijikata to punch him out, or at least get off him, but Hijikata didn't move. "Hijikata?" Getting no response, he lightly slapped Hijikata's face. "Hijikata?" Damn. Had Hijikata died of sex? He slapped him harder. "Hijikata! You son of a bitch! Don't you dare die on me! I don't want ears and a tail!"

Once again he didn't see the fist aimed at his jaw, but when he finally picked himself off the floor – this was getting to be a pattern that he wasn't entirely happy with – Hijikata was propped up in the bed, pale and panting, frantically trying to hide himself with his hands, which didn't seem to know which area of the body to block from Gintoki's sight.

"Get away from me, you sex-crazed maniac!" Hijikata snapped.

"I'm not the one who had multiple orgasms," Gintoki pointed out. "What's it like, anyway?"

"Yes. What's it like?"

Gintoki rolled off the bed and whirled, his hand going automatically to his waist and meeting nothing but air. Beside him, Hijikata had also sprung into an offensive stance. Naked, vulnerable and still panting, they glared at the Amanto ambassador from the restaurant.

The Amanto smirked. "I say. That was very pretty. I'm quite pleased with my new possessions."

"Possessions my ass!" Hijikata snapped.

"And it's a nice one," Gintoki murmured, stroking Hijikata's bum.

Hijikata struck his hand away. "I'm the Vice-Commander of the Shinsengumi, you bastard," he snarled at the Amanto. "You're under arrest."

"I'm afraid that you have no jurisdiction on this ship, Vice-Commander," the Amanto replied. "Besides, I'm an ambassador. I have diplomatic immunity."

"Were you the guy that made him into a cat-boy?" Gintoki demanded.

"Oi!"

"Not me, personally," the Amanto leered, "though he was altered per my specifications. He's quite gorgeous, don't you think?"

"Just because you made him pretty doesn't mean it's right," Gintoki snapped.

"I can talk for myself, asshole," Hijikata snapped in turn, still glaring at the Amanto. "Turn me back or I'll kill you!"

"Hmm." The Amanto didn't appear to move, but he was suddenly surrounded by several huge, hulking Amanto who looked like bulls. "You samurai are fiercer than I had expected. I'd hate to have to use drugs, but perhaps it's best..."

Before the last words left his mouth, Hijikata leapt. Gintoki watched in amazement as he punched the Amanto in the jaw, sending him flying. His tail blurred as he spun lightly, and Gintoki heard the solid _thunk_ of tail meeting flesh.

The guards were down. Hijikata quickly stooped and then disappeared through the door.

"Shit!" Gintoki grabbed whatever clothing he could lay his hands on and draped the holy toilet paper around his neck before springing after him, running roughshod over the Amanto guards laying on the floor. "How can he run in those damned stilettos?"

As he emerged from the room, he caught a glimpse of a naked ass and black tail disappearing around a corner and sprinted after. "Wait! You bastard!" He skidded around the corner and abruptly stopped.

Hijikata was waving an energy cannon menacingly at a platoon of Amanto soldiers, his tail lashing psychotically. "I'll blow a hole in this fucking ship if you get any closer," he was snarling at the Amanto.

Gintoki reconsidered his original idea to escape with Hijikata. He turned to head away from the crazy neko-chan and his energy cannon, only to be confronted by the soldiers they'd just escaped, looking battered and more than a bit pissed off. "It was him, not me!" he yelled, pointing at Hijikata. "He's the one with the killer tail!"

"Shut the fuck up and blast them!"

"With what?"

Hijikata turned to him, a stunned look on his face. "Didn't you grab a weapon on the way out of the room?"

"I grabbed the clothes!" Gintoki said defensively. "And the toilet paper!"

"You fucking moron!"

"At least I'll be a fucking moron with _clothes and a clean ass_," Gintoki snapped.

"You'll be a dead fucking moron if I get my hands on you."

"Fight naked if you want to then, neko-chan."

"Don't fucking call me NEKO-CHAN!" An energy blast took out the wall next to Gintoki's head. Hijikata whirled to confront the platoon. "You bastards die, too!" He pulled the trigger.

Since none of the Amanto seemed to carry swords, and since Gintoki wasn't too sure about the dynamics between energy cannons and the hulls of spaceships, he dropped the clothes and leapt into the fray unarmed. The huge bull Amanto couldn't move as quickly as he could, and in seconds, the way was clear.

He ran like hell for an exit.

"Wait, you son of a bitch!" he heard Hijikata yell, but an escape was an escape and Gintoki wasn't about to be caught because of some damned naked police-neko wearing stiletto heels.

Unfortunately, Hijikata caught up when Gintoki had to pause to fight his way past another half-dozen guards.

"Lazy ass! Where were you? You could have at least got here quick enough to help me!" Gintoki snapped, trying to catch his breath as the last of the guards slumped unconscious at his feet.

"You were going to leave me behind!"

"It's not my fault," Gintoki protested. "You were the one having fun shooting things up!"

"Asshole," Hijikata muttered. "Fine. Give me my dress."

Gintoki looked away and scratched his head.

"After all that, you left the clothes behind?"

"The wind runs naked," Gintoki pointed out. "And we've got toilet paper."

"Don't give me that bullshit, you just cut out and left them behind! You're a moron! Nobody escapes with no weapons and no clothes!"

"What?" Gintoki demanded. "Are you the Escape Nazi or something? Is there some kind of 'How to Escape' Shinsengumi instruction manual? Was I supposed to read it before I got kidnapped by aliens?"

"Everybody knows you always grab a weapon and clothes when you try to escape!"

"I don't see you carrying around any boxers, neko-boy!"

Hijikata's tail decked him. By the time Gintoki climbed to his feet, still dazed, Hijikata had vanished.

Gintoki finally caught up to him several corridors later, and only because Hijikata had stopped and was trying to open some sort of hatch.

"You were going to leave me behind!"

"It's not my fault that you have the reflexes of a turtle." Hijikata grimaced. "Fuck! Help me here, would you?"

"What are you doing?" Gintoki asked as he started tugging on the hatch wheel, too.

"Emergency escape pod. Now, _pull!_"

Gintoki put all of his strength into turning the wheel. With a protesting shriek, it finally began to rotate. There was a burst of compressed air, and then the hatch shifted inwards and up, leaving a dark, black hole just as an army of Amanto thundered into the corridor.

"Get in there and get the pod going!" Hijikata lifted the energy cannon to his shoulder. He looked so amazingly sexy in his stilettos, with the big-ass gun propped over his cute little boobs, his ears and tail twitching and his boy-bits half-awake from adrenaline, that Gintoki was pretty sure he had fantasy material enough for a lifetime. "I said _get in there!_ And wipe the fucking drool off your mouth while you're at it, pervert."

An energy blast punched a huge hole in the wall next to Gintoki, and he dove through the hatch. Hijikata landed on top of him.

"Ow ow ow ow ow!"

"Stop being a wimp," Hijikata demanded. "Launch the pod!" Hijikata took a position guarding the opening. Gintoki heard the whine of the energy cannon warming up, then the strange, muffled _buzz-shriek_ of its blast. "Hurry!"

"Shit, shit, shit, _shit_, SHIT!" The control panel in front of Gintoki was covered with dials and levers and brightly colored buttons. "It's the red button you're never supposed to push, right? The red one? Right? Right?"

"JUST FUCKING LAUNCH THE SHIP!" Hijikata screamed, blasting energy beams out the hatch.

"Right. Just like driving a scooter. Now's where's the fucking key?" Gintoki closed his eyes, took a deep breath and patted the console. Feeling a button, he pressed it.

The engine coughed and sputtered awake. There was a flash and an explosion in the cockpit as one of the soldiers managed a lucky hit.

"GET US OUT OF HERE YOU FUCKING MORON!"

"SHIT!" Gintoki started punching buttons and yanking levers as fast as he could. The engines began to sound like something that could fly a ship through space instead of something that his scooter could outrun, and there was the groan of metal rapidly straining beyond its ability to remain intact. Alarms shrilled, but the hatch door suddenly closed, nearly catching Hijikata and cleaving the cannon on his shoulder in two.

"You're gonna kill us, you idiot!" Hijikata bawled. Something snapped, sounding pretty damned serious to Gintoki, and the ship jolted in its moorings.

"You fly it then!"

"I can't fly it!"

"You're a total nerd! You should know all about this stuff, otaku-boy!"

"Fuck off!"

"What about Shinsengumi training?"

"They train us how to shoot people and slice people and beat up people, not how to fly spaceships, moron!"

"It's not my fault if we die!"

"I'll fucking kill you if you fucking kill us, shitty perm-head!"

Gintoki viciously stabbed a button. There was a loud rumbling sound, then another jolt. The monitor suddenly showed a disturbingly naïve universe stretched out before them, the Amanto ship getting smaller by the second.

"We're clear of the ship!"

Gintoki breathed a sigh of relief and pushed another button.

Alarm bells started shrieking. A nearby planet that had looked relatively small and harmless before suddenly seemed to be getting a whole hell of a lot bigger and more threatening. It also seemed to have an alarming tendency to spin so fast in the huge display screen that Gintoki felt like lace underwear in a heavy-duty industrial dryer.

"You're crashing us! You're making us crash!" Hijikata started punching buttons, but the ship just fell faster.

Suddenly, the cabin was filled with the unnerving hiss of escaping air.

"I'm going to die naked, next to a naked catboy," Gintoki gasped just before the air was sucked out of his lungs. His last vision was of Hijikata giving him the finger as they both grabbed at their throats and slipped into unconsciousness.


	3. Lesson 3: Don't Try This At Home

**Summary:** Lesson 3: In which Gintoki and Hijikata work off their debt on a pleasure planet, Hijikata demonstrates the perfect solution to aliens wanting sex for money, motivational revelations occur, and a solution to their problems is offered (along with an orgy).

**The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc**

**Lesson 3: Don't Try This At Home Unless You Look Good in a Hard Hat and Heels.**

They had the good luck to crash on a planet with a habitable atmosphere, big cities and a hospital that patched them up. To top it off, it was a pleasure planet, designed with sex and sin in mind. It should have been fucking heaven.

But that was where their luck ended.

oOoOoOo

Gintoki glanced at the debt bracelet around his wrist and sighed. No _Shonen Jump_ anywhere on the damned planet, just when he needed to steal ideas from some other manga about how to get home. He looked up, but the line in front of him wasn't any shorter, anxious Amanto waiting for their turn and watching him with open disgust, while Gintoki watched them with boredom and contempt. "Next."

He wasn't sure quite how it happened, but it seemed like the God of Shit-Ass-Really-Fucking-Bad-Luck was chasing them, baying like an insane hound from Hell. Yeah, the whole karaoke-performers-for-hire had been a bad idea – who knew Hijikata had the voice of a wounded bullfrog? – but the pole dancing had been pretty good once Hijikata had figured out what to do with his tail, and the bartending hadn't gone too badly until the manager caught Gintoki and Hijikata in a Dom Peri-chugging contest, and the gig with the cute babes in the short skirts had been perfect, even though the babes were guys in drag.

But every job ended the same way. Hijikata would be an asshole, Gintoki would chew him out for it, they'd scream and shout at each other and before you knew it, brawls would be breaking out, patrons would be bloody, the club they were working at would be trashed and their debt bracelets would take on another load of shitty financial karma.

And then they'd go back to their tiny, smelly, stifling room and have crazy-mad sex.

A shifty-eyed Amanto in a long line of shifty-eyed Amanto approached Gintoki's cubicle. "I heard there was a neko-chan available—"

"The neko-chan costs too much," Gintoki interrupted. "I've got a frog-chan that's more in your price range."

"But you don't know how much I have to spend!" the Amanto protested. "I want the neko-chan!"

"Sorry. No frog-chan? How about a nice, slimy eel-chan?"

"No aquatic-chans! A neko-chan!"

Hijikata stuck his head out from behind the curtain. "Fuck. Let him in, Sakata."

"Fine." Gintoki sighed. "How much's on your cash card?"

"One hundred thousand trampiles."

"Two minutes!" Gintoki called back. He took the Amanto's cash card and emptied it. Oho, the jerk had been lying. Gintoki brazenly credited the extra fifty thousand trampiles to his debt bracelet. "Tip," he explained.

"Two minutes!" The Amanto stared. "/That's an outrageous sum! Besides, I can't get off in two minutes!"

"One minute, forty-five seconds. Take it or leave it. If you take it, I suggest you start the heavy action on the way."

The Amanto unzipped his trousers and stuck his hand inside as he stumbled through the curtain. A moment later, there was a terrified shriek.

"Next!" Gintoki called.

Shit. The bracelet hadn't changed color. Not even a little bit.

oOoOoOo

They stumbled into their room at dawn. Hijikata immediately stripped out of his dress and kicked off his stilettos, then lit a cigarette and lounged in his garters.

"Bastard," Gintoki muttered. "You're driving me crazy."

"Don't blame that on me." Hijikata blew smoke at the ceiling. "You've always been an insane son of a bitch."

"Even a broom handle makes me hard these days." Gintoki scratched his balls. "Tree – _sproing_. Barber pole – _sproing_. Soba noodle – _sproing_."

"A soba noodle isn't a pole."

Gintoki yanked Hijikata's tail.

Hijikata snorted. "You're a pervert with sex on the brain," he said, but Gintoki was pretty sure that he was smirking around his cigarette.

"Mmm." Gintoki, feeling generous, draped himself over Hijikata and kissed a boob. "Damn. Stop smoking. You taste like shit."

"Shut up." Though Hijikata looked bored, Little Hijikata betrayed some interest. "Since you're feeling so damned randy, you might as well do something useful, you freak."

Gintoki trailed his fingers down Hijikata's stomach. Hijikata tensed, the cherry at the end of his cigarette flaring for an instant before he relaxed and spread his legs a bit wider.

"What the hell do you do to them behind the curtain?" Gintoki asked, lazily stroking.

"Twist their nuts."

"Oh. Huh." Gintoki rearranged himself and nuzzled at Hijikata's navel. "Hasn't anyone complained?"

"We still have our jobs, don't we?" Hijikata replied tersely. He stubbed his cigarette out, not meeting Gintoki's gaze.

Gintoki scratched his fingers through the coarse hair that led down Hijikata's abdomen. "How much longer do you think it's going to take to work off our debt?"

"The bracelets started out yellow and haven't even turned orange yet. We've got to make it through the full spectrum until they reach gold, remember?"

"We're gonna be here forever."

Hijikata shrugged. "Here's as good as anywhere."

Surprised, Gintoki abruptly sat up. "Don't you want to go home?"

"Go back to Edo? Why?" Hijikata snorted and reached for his pack of cigarettes again.

Gintoki frowned. "I don't get it. Why don't you want to go back?"

Hijikata looked at him from the corner of his eye, clearly disgusted. "I can't go back to the Shinsengumi like this."

"You can still fight—"

"I won't make the Shinsengumi the laughing stock of Edo or the Joui terrorists." He stood abruptly, his tail lashing, and grabbed his dress from the floor. "I'm going out."

"I'll come, too."

"No!" Hijikata started to move but caught himself, his fist clenched as if he could barely keep himself from punching Gintoki. "Just stay the fuck away from me. I don't need you."

Gintoki sat back against the headboard and stuck his finger in his nose. "Che. If you're an example of a Shinsengumi officer, they're already a bunch of pussies."

"What did you say?"

"They call you the 'demonic Vice-Commander,' but it looks to me like you're just a loser who's afraid of being laughed at."

"Bastard!"

Gintoki examined his finger and wiped it on Hijikata's pillow. "Gorilla-chan is the only guy in the Shinsengumi with balls, and his are the size of poodle nuts."

Hijikata brought his fists up. "You can insult me all you want to," he said, teeth clenched. "But LEAVE KONDO-SAN'S BALLS OUT OF IT, YOU SON OF A BITCH!" He launched himself at Gintoki, pinning him to the bed and swinging his fists wildly.

Gintoki tried to put his arms up in defense, but the bastard had straddled his right arm, so Gintoki could only flail with his left.

"KONDO-SAN'S BALLS ARE BIG AS SHIT!" Hijikata bellowed.

"BULLSHIT!" Gintoki shouted, flapping his hand ineffectually.

"BIG LIKE _ELEPHANT_ BALLS!"

"NO WONDER HE CAN'T WALK LIKE A NORMAL PERSON!"

"HE WALKS JUST FINE, ASSHOLE! HE WALKS LIKE A MAN!"

"LIKE A MAN WITH ELEPHANT NUTS!"

"BETTER THAN A MAN WITH GNAT NUTS LIKE YOU!" Hijikata buried his hands in Gintoki's hair and started pounding his head into the headboard.

"OW OW OW OW OW OW OW! OKAY, ALREADY! THE BASTARD HAS FUCKING ELEPHANT BALLS AND WALKS LIKE A MAN!"

"ELEPHANT BALLS OF STEEL!"

"ELEPHANT BALLS OF FUCKING _TITANIUM_!"

"That's better," Hijikata said. He stopped pounding Gintoki and sat up, though he still pinned him to the bed.

Gintoki grinned at him, feeling warm blood running down his cheek and into his ear. "So that's where you've been hiding."

"What?"

"The demonic Vice-Commander of the Shinsengumi. Shit. I thought they might have deactivated your balls or something when they sliced up your body."

Hijikata flushed and looked away. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

Gintoki waited. Hijikata finally huffed and met his gaze.

"It doesn't matter if Hijikata-chan is in a body that's old or weak or has cat ears and boobs," Gintoki said firmly. "He's stronger than any of that. He's a samurai. A samurai's strength lies in his soul, not in his body."

Hijikata froze. "You tricked me."

"No." Gintoki shook his head. "Just woke you up." He pushed Hijikata off and sat up painfully. "Shit, that hurt." He rubbed the back of his head. "So. Are you ready to turn the Shinsengumi over to Okita?"

Hijikata sighed and slumped against the headboard beside him. "Hell no. That guy's a bigger pussy than I am."

"Then help me figure out how to get us back home."

"Not yet." Hijikata pulled the dress over his head and stood, zipping it so deftly that Gintoki figured anyone watching would be justified in thinking that Hijikata had been a drag queen since he was in diapers. He admired the action until it sunk into his head that Hijikata was _getting dressed_, not _getting naked_.

"Wait a second! Where are you going? We just had a big epiphany scene! You can't just walk away. We're supposed to do some male bonding here, maybe have some more kinky sex! Kinky sex sells!"

"Later." Hijikata lit a cigarette. "Get cleaned up. You look like shit." He left the room.

"Go fuck yourself!" Gintoki yelled down the hallway at Hijikata's back. He suddenly paused and assessed his words. "You bastard!" he bellowed. "Don't you fucking _dare_ fuck yourself! Because that would be just too damned unfair to the rest of us poor bastards, you hear me?"

Hijikata flipped him the finger and disappeared around the corner.

"Shit." Gintoki winced. Damn, he felt like shit.

But it was worth the beating, to see Hijikata back.

Truth was, he was glad it was Hijikata who was with him on this insane journey. Shinpachi in ears and a tail would have been just too creepy, and Kagura with boy-bits would have meant the end of the universe. Hijikata was a bastard, yeah, but he could fight and his soul was clear and cold and gorgeous like a diamond, except when it flared white-hot with passion…

Gintoki paused.

Shit.

Diamond? White-hot passion?

"Damn," he whispered, closing his eyes and slumping against the bed. "Who the hell wrote this script, Stephenie Meyer?"

Love. Romance. Diamond soul and white-hot passion. Gintoki was the biggest fool in the galaxy. He thought of Hijikata again and examined the unfamiliar feeling in his chest. It was warmer than anything he'd felt before, warmer than Zura, his oldest friend, or Shinpachi or Kagura, his family, even warmer than the feeling he'd had for Shouyou-sensei, who had found him in a battlefield as a child, scavenging the belongs of dead samurai and dead Amanto for food, and taken him home.

Warmer. Yeah, right. This feeling _burned_. And not just like a flare-up of lust or a short-lived flame of passion, but all the way down to the warm, sustaining embers of companionship that smoldered deep in his gut's home hearth.

No matter which way he looked at it – by comparison to others, through the process of elimination, wearing the mirrored sunglasses of cynical worldliness or the rose-colored glasses of innocence – he reached the same conclusion every time.

He'd fallen for Hijikata.

Really, he was the stupidest samurai in the whole fucking universe.

Eventually he put on his kimono and slowly made his way to the baths.

oOoOoOo

When Gintoki awoke, late afternoon had given way to night. He could see Hijikata silhouetted against the bright rising double moons, a tiny glow betraying his cigarette. Gintoki had never owned anything in his life, had never wanted to own anything, because owning things meant responsibilities and he had a really shitty record when it came to responsibility, but at that moment, he wished that he owned at least a small portion of Hijikata's heart.

"The Amanto have a really sadistic sense of humor, recruiting samurai to be their police force," Hijikata said quietly, as if he were talking to himself.

Gintoki pretended to be asleep, mostly for Hijikata's sake, though he slit his eyes to watch the dark head with its cat ears that looked so natural in the moonlight.

"The legends say that at the end, there were three samurai left who struck fear in the hearts of the Amanto. Three samurai that the Amanto couldn't kill." The end of the cigarette brightened and faded. "Three samurai who escaped justice when the Amanto took over Japan and the Shogun made peace with them."

Gintoki watched and craved and listened.

"Katsura Kotaro. That madman, Takasugi Shinsuke. Some day we'll catch them. And then the Amanto will execute them."

Zura had better go down fighting, or Gintoki was going to kill him.

"But one disappeared. Shiroyasha – the White Demon." The cigarette glowed again. "They say he was crazy, that the Amanto feared him more than any other samurai. That he had the eyes of a dead fish unless he was fighting, and then they glowed red, like a youkai's."

Gintoki watched the cigarette's red glow disappear as Hijikata crushed it out on the windowsill.

"By the way, asshole, I know you're awake and listening."

Gintoki grunted and opened his eyes. He met Hijikata's gaze steadily.

Hijikata leaned back against the window frame. "Those dead-fish eyes? I think they're the eyes of an idiot, myself."

"A guy would have to be an idiot to take on the Amanto," Gintoki replied, keeping his voice careless and his eyes sharp.

Hijikata shrugged. "I figure it must have been a lot like the Shinsengumi, back then. Bastards all fighting dirty as hell, depending on each other just to stay alive, trying to save the country from scum. I wonder. Is it worth it?"

_So that's where he's going. Fucking dour son of a bitch. What's he got to be worried about?_ Gintoki relaxed and stretched until his joints popped. "Who knows? I'm not the kind of person who thinks about those kinds of questions. All I can protect is whatever's in reach of my sword. If someone thinks that they can protect more than that, it's just ego and dreams. All a guy can do is live until he dies."

"Dumb question, okay. It's your fault – I'm going crazy, hanging around you." Hijikata stood. "Doesn't matter. Once we're back in Edo, this all ends."

Gintoki had known it was coming, but he still winced, hoping the darkness would hide his reaction. At least Hijikata seemed resigned to going home now. "I never heard anyone say it would last even that long."

"It will." Hijikata climbed into the bed and straddled him. "Idiocy seems to be contagious."

"Che." Gintoki was hard as a rock as they settled down to business.

The door to their room burst open.

"Hahahah! Sorry, sorry, didn't know it was occupied—"

Hijikata yelped and pulled the sheets up in a vain attempt to hide his breasts, then started swearing a blue streak. He tried to leap at the intruder.

"Fuck!" Gintoki grabbed Hijikata's hips to hold him in place. "You're gonna rip off my joystick, you son of a bitch!"

Hijikata hit Gintoki in the balls with his tail and jumped off, leaving Gintoki howling and grabbing his crotch.

"Are you an assassin?" Hijikata demanded. "If you are, I'll kill you—!"

"Kintoki? Is that you?" A barrage of inane laughter assaulted Gintoki's ears. "Kinky!"

"Don't call me 'testicles', you asshole," Gintoki gasped. "It's _Gin_toki!" Shit. They were saved! He'd know that moronic laugh anywhere! Sakamoto Tatsuma might be the most air-headed fool in the galaxy, but he had a fleet of spaceships and could fly anything with a rocket booster.

"It's so funny! I didn't know you had a cat fetish, too. Say, is the neko-chan prostitute any good?"

Sakamoto grinned appreciatively at Hijikata for the split-second it took for Hijikata's fist to launch him across the room and through the door across the hallway. Screams and the dull thud of fists on flesh intermingled with the laughter of a crazy man, fading when Hijikata slammed their door closed.

Gintoki desperately tried to uncurl. "Get him back! Get him back!"

"I'm not doing some goddamned kinky threesome shit!" Hijikata spat, his tail lashing and his ears laid back.

"He's got a ship!"

"I don't give a damn if he— He's got a ship?"

"A ship!" Gintoki groaned. "I'm ruined for life, you asshole."

"Shut up." Hijikata yanked their door open and stalked through the shattered remains of the doorway across the hall. There was a further brief flurry of fighting sounds, then Hijikata reappeared, grimly dragging Sakamoto's unconscious form behind him, a delighted smile still gracing Sakamoto's face.

Gintoki gingerly sat up. "Is he dead?"

"Not yet." Hijikata dropped Sakamoto. "And get off your ass already. You're such a girl."

"I'm not the one with the boobs," Gintoki pointed out with dignity. "Besides, you nearly tore the damned thing out by its roots. I'm taking the Kegel exerciser back to the store. You're tight enough already."

"Die already, asshole!"

It took them nearly ten minutes to bring Sakamoto back to consciousness.

"Oh. Hello. Kintoki, right? Long time, no see."

"_Gintoki_, and we've seen quite a bit of each other in the past half hour," Gintoki muttered. "Where's your ship?"

"Somewhere up there." Sakamoto waved vaguely at the ceiling. "I think Mutsu's parking it."

"Call Mutsu and tell her to bring it down. You're leaving right now, and you're taking us with you."

"But, wait! I heard there's this neko-chan that's supposed to be a knock-out – Whoa!" Sakamoto breathed as he saw Hijikata. "Fast work, Kin-chan! How'd you know I wanted to try out the neko-chan?" He beamed at Hijikata. "Hi! I'm Sakamoto Tatsuma and I want to pay you a lot of money for sex."

"Sorry, but that neko-chan's spoken for." Gintoki glowered at Sakamoto.

"Sorry, but this neko-chan can speak for himself," Hijikata snapped.

"Ah, okay, okay," Sakamoto said, laughing and patting the air to calm them down. "Threesome it is, then! Kin-chan has a nice enough ass, I guess—"

This time, it took nearly half an hour to revive him.

"You nearly killed him," Hijikata muttered.

"I was traumatized," Gintoki said, staring blankly into space. "Don't blame the guy with the trauma."

Hijikata regarded Sakamoto speculatively. "He doesn't seem that dangerous to me. I think you're a fucking drama camel."

"You haven't seen the size of him," Gintoki whispered. "Dildos don't even come as big as him."

"Not even novelty ones?"

"Not even elephant ones!"

"Oi. Enough with the elephant jokes."

Sakamoto groaned and laughed. "Ha ha ha. Fancy meeting you here, Kintoki," he said, shakily sitting up. "Long time no see—"

"Been there already," Hijikata interrupted, hauling Sakamoto to his feet. "Can you stand on your own?"

"Sure, sure, no problem." Sakamoto collapsed to the floor when Hijikata let go.

"You seriously want to get into a spaceship with this asshole?" Hijikata asked Gintoki.

Gintoki sighed dramatically and raised his eyes to the ceiling, projecting trauma with all his soul.

"Oh for cripes sake," Hijikata said in disgust. He shook Sakamoto. "Look, we don't have time for this kind of crap. Our shift starts in half an hour, and I want to stop twisting nuts for a living, got me?"

"Oh, my." Sakamoto looked vaguely impressed. "I have a pair of velvet mittens—"

"If you don't shut up, I'll stuff 'em full of explosives and shove 'em up your ass!" Hijikata snapped. "Now get us off this fucking planet."

Twenty minutes later, they were on Sakamoto's ship and already nearly out of the star system.

"If you're shy, we could get the crew to join the three of us in a ship-wide orgy," Sakamoto offered, smiling inanely at Hijikata. "Then there wouldn't be anything to be embarrassed about." He adjusted his sunglasses. "Autopilot works pretty well as long as we don't hit a planet or a black hole or something."

"No."

"Your neko-friend is a bit frigid, isn't he?" Sakamoto stage-whispered to Gintoki.

"I heard you, asshole." Hijikata whirled and caught Gintoki semaphoring madly behind him. "And don't semaphore behind my back, you jerk!"

"He gets cranky right about this time of the month," Gintoki said apologetically. "Some booze and heavy duty painkillers seem to take the edge off him, though."

"Mutsu's the same way," Sakamoto replied, shaking his head. "Hot compresses help."

"Really? I'll have to try that—"

"Stop right there. I'm not on the rag and I won't ever be, so quit it with the female hormones shit. I was too stupid to think about making sure that I wouldn't get cat appendages and girl parts when I negotiated my contract for this goddamned manga and anime, but I sure as hell made certain that the standard 'no male-preg' clause was included."

"Wait!" Gintoki protested. "The first time we did it, you said you didn't want to get pregnant! You made me wear a condom!"

Hijikata regarded him as if he were slime. "And you haven't used one since, have you?"

"I thought you were on the pill!"

"The pill? You've got to be kidding! Look, that first time I wasn't sure if I was a guy or not, anymore. The way the producers use loopholes, I didn't want to find out that the 'no male-preg' clause was void because I was a girl. The doctors at the hospital that patched us up after the crash told me that I couldn't get pregnant, even if I didn't have the clause."

Gintoki felt the blood drain from his face.

Hijikata's gaze was shrewd, and more than a little smug. "You don't have it, do you?"

Now he felt himself turning green. He plastered on a grin, pretty sure it was probably pathetic and transparent as hell. "Heh, heh, heh, it probably won't ever come up, hey? Not for the main character. Right? Right?"

"I hope they make a fucking movie out of it," Hijikata muttered.

"You both should have done what I did – negotiate for the most science-fiction-y role, then make sure that a 'has access 24/7 to a brilliant alien surgeon' clause gets put in. No more worries, no matter what the producers do to you!" Sakamoto grinned.

"You have access 24/7 to a brilliant alien surgeon?" Hijikata growled.

"Didn't I just say that? I could have sworn I just said that."

"A brilliant alien surgeon who could remove cat ears, cat tails and girl-bits?"

"Sure, no problem. Just a few weeks ago, I was negotiating a deal with this weird three-eyed Amanto ambassador guy, and I loaned him my surgeon for a couple of days to sweeten the pot—"

"YOUR CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS GAVE ME GODDAMNED GIRL-BITS AND CAT EARS, YOU BASTARD!"

"Don't forget the tail," Gintoki reminded Hijikata. "And stop whining. At least you've got a fucking 'no mpreg' clause."

"What?" Sakamoto turned to Gintoki. "What? Isn't he a neko-chan?"

"Not naturally," Gintoki admitted.

"Well, hell. My apologies, Hijikata-san. I'll call for the surgeon immediately."

"Wait!" Hijikata grabbed Sakamoto by the throat. "You can fix me?"

Sakamoto struggled to breathe. "Of course, though I hope you'll reconsider," he gasped. "You may want to have children some day."

"Not that kind of fix, asshole! I meant, you can make me human again? A male human? A fully-functioning, no-pussy-at-all-anywhere-on-my-body-in-either-girl-or-cat-terms male human?"

"If that's what you want," Sakamoto choked. "Though the ears are cute."

"The ears go."

Sakamoto and Gintoki gave identical regretful sighs.

oOoOoOo

Gintoki waited anxiously in the room Sakamoto had given them for Hijikata to return from surgery.

He chewed on his thumb; his foot twitched like a kangaroo hopping.

He just couldn't turn off his brain. So many things could go wrong.

What happened if Hijikata wasn't sexy any more after the operation? If Gintoki's heart still wanted him, but Little Gintoki said, 'that's a guy' and kept sleeping? It would be embarrassing as hell.

Or what happened if his heart and Little Gintoki were all on board with the idea of Hijikata being a guy, but Little Hijikata said, 'that's a guy' about Gintoki and kept sleeping? That would be even more embarrassing.

Or what would happen if both of their hearts and both of their little guys were cool with everything, but just as they started to have great sex, Sakamoto drove the spaceship through an exploding star or something? And then they turned up in Hell and all of the people that they knew who had gone to Hell before them saw them having sex? Could you die again from embarrassment? Was there an embarrassment hell waiting for you after you'd died once already?

Or what would happen if Hijikata and Sakamoto got the hots for each other? Gintoki tried to envision them together and had to restrain himself from stalking through the ship and carrying out pre-emptive homicide on its captain, just in case.

Or what would happen if…?

oOoOoOo

Hours went by.

oOoOoOo

Hijikata never showed up.

oOoOoOo

Gintoki finally ran into Hijikata a couple of days later, in the smoking section of the mess hall.

It was weird to see Hijikata dressed in a distinctly unsexy light blue kimono and slippers instead of the tight black cheongsam and stilettos, and to see his hair lie smooth and shiny against his skull with no protruding ears. But the thing that hit Gintoki hardest was the loss of Hijikata's tail – Hijikata's strong, deadly, gorgeous tail – and the way it had spoken of Hijikata's thoughts and moods. Without it, it seemed to Gintoki as if Hijikata had donned a mask.

"Hey."

Hijikata grunted and took a deep hit of his cigarette. A huge bowl of mayonnaise-covered foodstuff-turned-dog food sat untouched in front of him.

"Surgery went okay?"

Hijikata shrugged and blew smoke.

"Ah," Gintoki replied, nodding inanely and clutching his strawberry milk. "Good. Well. Nice to see you."

He walked away. When he reached the door to the hall, he paused and looked back.

Hijikata didn't look up. The end of his cigarette glowed.

Gintoki dropped the strawberry milk into the first garbage chute he found.

oOoOoOo

Bored out of his mind, Gintoki discovered the crew lounge. More importantly, he discovered the crew lounge's stash of _Jump_. One particular lounge in one particular area became his, marked by the plethora of candy wrappers and bowed-back _Jump_s strewn in haphazard piles over and around it. Crewmembers gave him a wide berth; he wasn't sure if it was because they didn't want to be associated with a man his age who spent all his time reading manga, or because he had a tendency these days to stare through anyone who addressed him.

"Oi. Yorozuya."

Gintoki nudged the _Jump_ he'd placed over his face to the side and stared up at Hijikata with a bleary eye. "What?"

Hijikata frowned and looked away, shifting as if he were uncomfortable. He shrugged. "Nothing."

"Fine." Gintoki nudged the _Jump_ back into place and closed his eyes.

"Oi!"

"You said 'nothing.'" Silence greeted his words and he sighed, then sat up and laid the magazine aside. "What is it?"

Hijikata shifted again and mumbled something.

"I can't hear you."

"I said, where did you get the _Jump_?"

"Is the otaku going through withdrawal?" Gintoki couldn't keep a note of bitter taunting from his voice. Fuck Hijikata and his moodiness, anyway.

"Fuck off!" Hijikata whirled and stalked away.

Cursing, Gintoki jumped up and ran after Hijikata, grabbing his shoulder. "Look, I don't know what's going on in that damned head of yours, but can't you at least be civil?"

"Me be civil? How about you? You're the one hiding behind a stupid kid's book!"

"That's because when I tried to talk to you, you acted like I was a dog turd on the bottom of your shoe!"

"Look. Just because I don't have ears and a tail anymore doesn't mean you should start treating me like shit and avoiding me! Or was it the girl-bits that you liked about me in the first place?" Hijikata asked suspiciously. "It was, wasn't it?"

"Shut up, you asshole! You weren't just another fucking pussy!"

There was a titter of nervous laughter from several of the off-duty crewmembers.

"Fuck off!" Gintoki and Hijikata yelled at them.

"Follow me, jerk," Gintoki said, grabbing Hijikata's wrist. "We're gonna talk."

"What is it with this talking thing?" Hijikata demanded as Gintoki dragged him towards the quarters that they were supposed to be _sharing_, dammit. "We never talk. Stop treating me like some goddamned girl and let me beat the shit out of you, asshole!"

"Where have you been sleeping?"

"In the infirmary!"

"For the past four nights?" They reached the room, and Gintoki swiped his keycard. He pushed Hijikata inside before the door opened fully and followed him in, punching the 'close and lock' button viciously.

"I couldn't sleep," Hijikata muttered defiantly, not meeting Gintoki's eyes. "I just hung out, that's all."

Finally taking a proper look, Gintoki realized there were deep bags under Hijikata's eyes. "Idiot." He pushed him towards the bed. "Take off your clothes and get some sleep."

"Naked, huh? And what if I want to leave my clothes on?"

"Leave 'em on, then. Just get some sleep, for crying out loud!"

Hijikata continued to glare for a few seconds, then slumped. He loosened his obi and allowed the kimono to drop to the floor before he crawled into the bed.

He looked strangely vulnerable without the tail. Gintoki sighed, undressed, and crawled in next to him.

"I don't have boobs anymore," Hijikata snapped. "So just fucking leave me alone, all right?"

"I know you don't have boobs. Well, girl boobs, anyway." Gintoki was careful not to touch Hijikata's body, curling up with his back towards him. After a few tense moments, Hijikata relaxed and sighed.

"I'm really tired."

"Then go to sleep," Gintoki repeated patiently. He could hear Hijikata moving restlessly behind him. "What?"

"The sheets are cold."

"Dammit." Gintoki rolled over and put his arms around Hijikata, pulling him close and spooning around him. "Better?"

Hijikata grunted.

They lay without speaking, until Gintoki could hear the soft, regular snores that meant Hijikata was finally asleep. Unable to keep his own eyes open, he curled closer.

"I missed you," he whispered, hardly more than a breath.

As he started to slip into sleep, Hijikata nestled closer, like a contented kitten.

"Gintoki…you bastard…"

Gintoki fell asleep, a stupid grin plastered across his face.

oOoOoOo

He woke up to someone fumbling with Little Gintoki. "Hmm?"

A hand pressed his hip into the futon. "Just shut up."

"You feel so good," Gintoki whispered, closing his eyes so that he could concentrate on the puffs of breath against the sensitive skin of his inner thighs. He ran his fingers through Hijikata's hair, scratching his scalp gently and kneading the base of his neck. "I love the sounds you make, like you can't get enough of me."

It wasn't until Gintoki returned the favor that he realized something was off.

No more girl-bits.

He bobbed his head smoothly, relishing the weight and bulk of Little Hijikata in his mouth, and it was enough. More than enough, actually. Hell, it was damned good.

A part of him, deep in the back of his mind, was momentarily surprised that he wasn't wishing that Hijikata had never had the corrective surgery, then it too was caught up in the delicious intensity of sex with another man, and why the hell was it taboo when it felt and tasted as good as this, anyway? Pressure built, the sweet promise of impending orgasm. He dropped his head back on the pillow and groaned; Little Hijikata hung red and angry in his face, glistening with Gintoki's saliva. He wasn't sure if he'd ever seen anything quite as sexy. He spat into his hands and reached for it again.

Hijikata's tongue suddenly pressed at just the perfect place, the place that always made Gintoki shudder and curl his toes and come really, really hard, like an 'On' switch for Little Gintoki. A moment later, Hijikata was coming, too, warm drops falling on Gintoki's eyelids and cheeks and open, panting mouth, and it was so damned sexy that he felt another, smaller tremor as he came again, more spasm than discharge, but still wonderful and perfect.

Hijikata relaxed and slumped on top of him, hard and lean and heavy. Gintoki rested his head against Hijikata's inner thigh and licked him clean.

Gintoki didn't miss the perky boobs, not even a little bit.

Just before he went to sleep, he grabbed Hijikata and tugged. "C'mere."

Grumbling, Hijikata rearranged himself until they were lying next to each other. Gintoki draped over him, laying his head on Hijikata's chest. He savored the feeling of Hijikata's fingers absentmindedly scratching through his hair, and the sound of his heart beating underneath Gintoki's ear.

"Let's do this a lot," Gintoki said.

"Only until we get home. Then everything goes back to normal."

"I know."

Hijikata sighed and shifted slightly. Gintoki could swear he felt Hijikata's lips press against his hair.

"All right."

Gintoki closed his eyes and tried to think of ways to keep Sakamoto from reaching Edo any time soon.


	4. Lesson 4: Make Sure There's a Party

**Summary:** Lesson 4: In which Gintoki and Hijikata return to Edo, and everything goes nearly back to normal, except that reading _Shonen Jump_ suddenly seems to be a bit lacking. Otherwise, it's Yorozuya business as usual until Harusame pirates show up. Also, Gintoki and Hijikata redefine the word 'gay.'

**The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc**

**Lesson 4 (the Final Lesson): In an Unlit Alley, All Cats are Black. Or White. Whatever, It's Not That Important, Just Make Sure There's a Party in the End.**

They reached Earth much too soon.

The viewscreen that hung in one corner of the bedroom had first shown Earth as a lovely blue marble. The marble had steadily grown throughout the day into the calm, serene façade of home and normality that had filled the screen up to a few minutes before, when they'd gone through the space gate.

Gintoki knew that the pristine beauty was misleading, though. What looked lovely from space was just a mask that hid Edo's real face: dirt and pain and squalor. His old life, waiting for him.

"We're back. We've landing in Edo," Gintoki clarified.

"Hmph."

"People will be getting off the ship."

"Hmph."

"I wonder if Kagura and Shinpachi will be around." Gintoki tried to sound cheerful. "It's been a while."

Hijikata grunted. "Remember."

Oh well. He'd given it his best try. Damn. He really didn't want to have this conversation. "I won't say anything.'"

"What about that guy?"

"Sakamoto can't even remember his own name. Don't worry."

Hijikata grunted again.

They left their bedroom and silently joined the crowds leaving the ship, entering the huge, echoing passenger boarding bridge that would take them to the terminal proper, where, according to Sakamoto, their friends were waiting.

"Just like before," Hijikata said tersely. "We're enemies."

"Like before. I hate you," Gintoki replied woodenly.

"I hate you more."

Inside, something snapped. Gintoki didn't mind lying. He lied all the time. And besides, this wasn't a lie, was it? He really fucking hated Hijikata right now. "I hate you more more."

"I hate you more more more—"

"Fuck off!" Gintoki let loose the uppercut he'd been holding back, and Hijikata went down like a rock. Gintoki stood over him, fists clenched. "I get it! You fucking hate me! Just shut up already!"

Hijikata rubbed his jaw and glared. "Bastard!"

Gintoki curled his lip. "You're the biggest fucking asshole this side of that fucking Amanto who kidnapped us. Just stay the hell away from me!"

"That's my line!"

"Sorry. I got it first." Gintoki managed to restrain himself from kicking Hijikata in the balls. Instead, he stalked away, his insides twisting so hard he could barely breathe. The goddamned prick! Yeah, it had to end. He got that. But it didn't have to go back to the way it was before, did it? No fucking anymore, but hell, they could have sake together or go to the bathhouse or hang out at a hostess club, couldn't they?

But no, they couldn't, because the goddamned Vice-Commander of the Shisengumi wouldn't be caught dead with a loser like Gintoki. "I hope his balls shrivel up and fall off," Gintoki muttered.

"Gin-san!"

"Gin-chan!"

Before he could turn, something big and wet and hot and painful descended over his head. Beyond Shinpachi's and Kagura's urgent attempts to get the damned dog off him, he could hear Hijikata's derisive voice and the laughter of a number of men, presumably the Shinsengumi bastards. Snarling, he pried Sadaharu's jaws from around his throat.

"Fuck off!" he yelled at Hijikata, who was smoking a cigarette, surrounded by assholes in black uniforms.

"Gin-san?" Shinpachi glanced between Gintoki and Hijikata. "Is something wrong?"

"Never get kidnapped with a jerk," Gintoki said loudly.

"Okay," Kagura said brightly. "But if I do, I'll just kill him if he gets too annoying."

"Yeah. Good plan."

"Never get kidnapped with an idiot who forgets to pick up a weapon in an escape." Hijikata made sure his voice carried, and Gintoki found himself glaring at a sea of amused Shinsengumi faces.

"Never get kidnapped with a prick who doesn't know how to fly a spaceship."

"Never get kidnapped with a fool who punches the red button on a console."

"Never get kidnapped with a guy who can't fucking pole-dance!"

"Never get kidnapped with a guy who has a cat fetish!'

"You have a cat fetish, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked. "Isn't that Shinpachi's character trait?"

"Oi! I do NOT have a cat fetish!" Shinpachi shuddered and glared. "I am the most cat-fetish-free man in the world!"

"Right, neko-fetish-boy. Sic him, Sadaharu!"

"No, I fucking don't have a cat fetish!" Gintoki shouted after them as Sadaharu bounded at Shinpachi's heels, teeth bared, Kagura shouting in her annoyingly joyous bloodthirsty fashion. _Not one you need to know about, anyway_. He whirled to face the Shinsengumi again. "Never get kidnapped with a fucking police officer!"

"Never get kidnapped with a lazy good-for-nothing freeloader!"

"Never get kidnapped with someone with a mayonnaise fetish!"

"Never get kidnapped with a sugar-freak!"

"Never get kidnapped with a smoker!"

"Never get kidnapped with a naturally-permed dickwad!"

"I think the lesson we can take from this," Okita said, looking interested, "is never to be stupid enough to get kidnapped in the first place. Kondo-san? Do you really need a Vice-Commander who's that inept?"

"OI! DIE YOU BASTARD!"

Gintoki watched as Hijikata chased after Okita, feeling a strange mixture of relief and jealousy.

A hand clasped his shoulder. "Nothing happened, did it? To Toshi, I mean."

"Of course not. What could have happened?" Gintoki replied bitterly. "He's the fucking Demonic Vice-Commander of the Shinsengumi."

"It's just that he seems more wound up than usual," Kondo said, frowning thoughtfully. "Like there's something important he's not saying."

The gorilla could be disconcertingly perceptive at times. "Ask him about it, not me," Gintoki said. "OI! SHINPACHI! KAGURA! WE'RE GOING HOME!"

"Yes, Gin-chan!" floated back to him, both kids with huge grins on their faces, though Shinpachi looked a bit bloody and spittle-soaked. Gintoki hoped that they hadn't used up all of the bandaging while he was gone, but didn't really believe that the hope was realistic, given Sadaharu's oral fixation.

oOoOoOo

It felt good to drive the scooter again. The streets were as dirty and squalid as Gintoki remembered, and the press of Shinpachi's body behind his felt like a homecoming. Sadaharu raced beside him, snapping at his front tire from time to time and looking particularly vicious in his happiness, while Kagura shouted into the wind at Gintoki, her words unintelligible, though she seemed to be pointing out all of the changes that had taken place during his absence.

They were safe. They were alive. They were happy. They were together.

And it was true. Gintoki was happy, really happy to be with the two people who stuck to him even when he was a bastard, who were both strong enough that Gintoki could rely on them not to die. But, somehow, it felt like he should be _happier_.

When they got back to the flat, Gintoki let Shinpachi and Kagura abuse him verbally even as they made sure that he had strawberry milk and – the little idiots – every single issue of _Jump_ that had come out since he was abducted, including the stupid esoteric ones that nobody ever read. He immediately kicked them off his favorite sofa and settled in with the stack, half-listening to their background chattering, which rapidly turned into all-out war, familiar and welcoming. Sadaharu stretched out on the other sofa and immediately fell asleep.

Gintoki opened the first _Jump_ and began to read. But the pictures and words seemed empty, and he found that he was having a hard time concentrating on them. Not because of the background noise, though Sadaharu's snores were something he hadn't missed… well, not much. It was more that the pages seemed too clean, too virgin, too unsoiled to him. He'd fought over those same damned magazines with Hijikata, tearing a few of them up in the process, but each one had held his interest and had seemed… Gintoki wasn't sure, but they'd seemed real. Like the first _Jump_ he remembered reading when he was young, when Sensei had merely smiled at the torn and stained and barely-used remnants of his schoolbook and had given him a copy of the magazine to read instead.

He stifled a sigh, closed his eyes and laid the magazine across them. Stupid as it was, on the long trip back to Edo, Gintoki had got used to sharing his _Jump_. Preferred it, even. _Jump_ was always good, but the best ones were the ones that he'd had to fight for, or fight over, or wrestle away from the otaku-punk-cum-police officer who spilled mayonnaise over every other page, leaving large oily stains that made the paper glow against the overhead light like a lantern lit by candle-flame, so you could see the images on both sides of the page at once and feel like it was okay that the universe was just that crazy.

"Fuck."

That son of a bitch.

Gintoki could only hope that Okita had thoroughly humiliated Hijikata and taken his job over for good. Or that Hijikata fell asleep while smoking and burned himself up. Either would be just fine by him.

oOoOoOo

"Thank you for your patronage," Gintoki intoned, bored as hell as another group of assholes left Saigou's okama bar. His make-up felt heavy and hot on his face, and he hadn't had half-enough sake yet to make up for a night of dressing up like a girl.

"Thank you for your patronage." And then there was Shinpachi's attitude, which had degenerated from his usual annoying-as-hell to a much more unusual _irritating_-as-hell the day after Gintoki got back. Just like Kagura's had, though it was harder to tell with her, since she was such a little bitch to begin with.

"Thank you for your patronage," he said to the next person in line.

"Oi! Paako!" A rough hand clouted him over the ear.

"Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch!" Gintoki glared up at Saigou's towering form. At least the pigtails had cushioned the worst of the okama's blow. "What, you blue-chinned old hag? This is what you asked me to do, isn't it?"

"I asked you to be a _hostess_, dammit, not some naturally permed robot!" Saigou looked intently at Gintoki and snorted in disgust. "Oh, what's the use? Just get up on stage and dance a little. And look like you're having fun, for fuck's sake!"

Gintoki slouched his way to the stage. Shinpachi was already there, doing a few half-hearted gyrations and waving a fan around listlessly. Gintoki picked up a fan and joined him.

Shinpachi looked like his panties were busy twisting. "How much longer do we have to do this job, Paako?"

"Until closing time, Paachi."

"Why did I have to come on this job in the first place, Paako?"

"Because I'm not going to dress like a girl and dance for dirty old men alone, Paachi."

Shinpachi sighed heavily. "No wonder girls won't look at me."

"No, that's because of the glasses, Paachi."

"Oi!" Shinpachi stopped dancing to glare.

"Hey! Freak! Shake that ass!" some drunken asshole in the audience shouted.

"Shut up, jerk!" Shinpachi yelled back. "What are you doing in a place like this anyway? Go back to your lonely, pathetic flat and watch TV while you fart and scratch your balls, why don't you?"

"Paachi!" Gintoki was impressed. "You've become a man!"

"Someone had to," Shinpachi snapped back. "You left us!" He stalked off the stage, Gintoki staring after him in astonishment.

"Go after him," Saigou sighed, appearing at Gintoki's side. "The night's shot to hell, anyway. Why I keep asking you guys to fill in, I'll never understand."

"Because we're so damned gorgeous, that's why!" Gintoki retorted, lifting his tight kimono to free his legs. He ran after Shinpachi.

"It's because you're cheap!" he heard Saigou yell after him.

Shinpachi made good time; it took Gintoki viciously elbowing his way through several crowded blocks before he finally caught up to him. He grabbed Shinpachi's arm. "Oi! Shinpachi! What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong! Why would anything be wrong?" Shinpachi shook Gintoki's hand off and stood nearly eye-to-eye with him. "Just because we didn't know if you were dead or alive for five months!"

_When did he grow so tall?_ "It wasn't my fault!" Gintoki protested. "I was kidnapped by a pervert!"

"You could have called us or something!" Shinpachi retorted. "At least have let us know that you were alive! It's not like you forgot your phone—" he stopped and looked at Gintoki suspiciously. "You _didn't_ forget your phone number, did you?"

For a second, Gintoki contemplated taking the easy out and claiming post-traumatic phone number memory loss. Then he shook his head. "I forgot to call."

"That's what I thought. And if you ever, EVER, dare tell that to Kagura, I'll kill you!" Shinpachi clenched his hands. "She cried. Kagura _cried_. Every night! I could hear her sniffling in the closet after she went to bed."

"Probably allergies—"

"It wasn't fucking allergies!" Before Gintoki could react, Shinpachi had hooked his fingers deep in Gintoki's nostrils. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Owowowowow!"

"You didn't think to call us," Shinpachi said, his voice low and dangerous. "Not once."

"It's not like I had it easy, either!"

"You were alive, dammit! You knew your own fucking phone number, dammit! And don't try to tell me it was because you didn't have any money, you jerk! You think Ms. Otose wouldn't have accepted reverse charges if you'd called?"

Gintoki snorted around Shinpachi's fingers, but the kid was right. He'd been too busy fucking Hijikata. Hijikata, the guy who hated him. "I'm sorry, Shinpachi," he said, suddenly too depressed to be defensive. "I'm really, really sorry."

Shinpachi glared and then yanked his fingers out of Gintoki's nose. "Jerk! How can I stay mad at you like that? You look like a whipped puppy."

Gintoki rubbed the back of his neck.

"And now I've got your snot all over my fingers."

"Here. Wipe it off with these damned pigtails," Gintoki said, pulling one off his head. "I'll give 'em back to Saigou and let him deal with it."

Shinpachi made a big deal of wiping his fingers. "You act like everything's gone back to normal." He obviously wasn't going to let go of his grudge that easily.

"It's because I want everything to be normal again," Gintoki said. "Like it used to be."

"Aren't you the one who says that nothing in life ever stays?" Shinpachi handed back the pigtail and sighed. "I'm sorry I got so angry."

"No. I deserved it."

"Yeah, you did. But it's done now. You're back." Shinpachi moved, and Gintoki found himself squeezed so tight he could barely breathe. "You'd better be glad it's me and not Kagura who's doing this," Shinpachi muttered. "She'd break you in two."

Gintoki smiled and patted Shinpachi's head. "Yeah. She would. Uh, Shinpachi-kun?"

"Yes, Gin-san?"

"There's a lot of guys looking at us right now. I think they're thinking perverted thoughts."

"Fuck 'em. Haven't they ever seen a girl hug another girl before?"

"Probably. You can buy DVDs."

Shinpachi drew back and wiped his tear-stained face on Gintoki's kimono. "Yeah. Kagura and I found some of them when we were cleaning out your things."

"What! You went through my porn-, er, my erotic DVDs?"

"If Kagura turns into a lesbian, it's your fault."

"Is that why she's been watching 'Wet T-Shirt Babes Sumo Wrestling' late at night?" Gintoki felt dazed. "I thought it was just because she was trying to pick up some pointers on how to fight dirty."

"Kagura already fights dirty. Face reality, Gin-san. She's a Kyubei in the making."

"But Kyubei turned out that way because her father and grandfather messed with her head."

Shinpachi said nothing, just looked at Gintoki significantly.

"What?"

Shinpachi rolled his eyes. "I'm going home. See you later."

"Wait! I'll come with you."

"I think someone wants to talk to you first," Shinpachi said. "He's been watching us for a while, now. See you back at the house."

Someone… Gintoki turned and caught a glimpse of a glowing cigarette and a lanky figure in black.

Hijikata.

"Bastard!" He made his way through the crowd. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Hijikata looked at him appraisingly, his eyes cold. "I could arrest you for public indecency, you know."

"You do, and Saigou and the other okamas will tear the Shinsengumi headquarters down around your ears," Gintoki retorted. "This isn't the first time I've seen you around, either. What? Does the Shinsengumi give overtime to stalkers or something?"

"You're a known public nuisance. Someone has to keep an eye on you."

"Watch your own bellybutton, jerk. Just leave me alone. That's what we're supposed to be doing, right? Going back to the way things were?"

Hijikata frowned. "You sound like you're trying to convince yourself."

That was too low. "Just fuck yourself," Gintoki snarled. "Oh, that's right! You can't anymore! Too bad. But you can buy a blow-up doll in the next street." He stomped away, pissed as hell that his okama outfit made him look more like a flouncing girl than a rightfully enraged virile male ex-lover.

"Keep the eyeshadow!" Hijikata shouted after him. "It makes your eyes look more like a dead parakeet than a dead fish!"

Gintoki flipped him the finger, grimly making the best of his pathetic exit until a pervert pinched his ass and he had to stop to beat the shit out of the bastard.

By the time he was finished, Hijikata was gone, though the scent of his cigarette lingered, strangely fresh amidst the gasoline fumes and the stench of day-old garbage that filled the humid night air.

oOoOoOo

Gintoki felt the chill of cold steel slice into his guts.

He grabbed his sword with both hands and split open the Amanto pirate's skull, but he could already hear the others coming. Gintoki slumped to the floor clutching his stomach, and wondered if his guts would fall out all over his hand.

"Gin-san!"

"Gin-chan!"

"Watch our backs," he ordered, breathing deep and trying not to pass out. "I'm fine."

Kagura and Shinpachi gave him identical doubtful looks, but obediently took positions at point while he struggled to get past the initial shock of the Harusame space pirate's attack.

They'd been hired to do a simple property recovery; either the job had been a trap, or the stupid shopkeeper who had hired them was mixed up in some pretty bad shit and hadn't bothered to tell them. Gintoki cursed steadily under his breath and pulled the upper part of his kimono tight around his stomach as a temporary bandage.

"Gin-san, they're coming," Shinpachi whispered.

"From this way, too," Kagura confirmed.

The pirates were between them and the warehouse doors, and the damned building didn't have any windows. Gintoki knew that if he was at full strength, he could have slashed a hole in the side of the building, but with his stomach muscles as damaged as they were… "Kagura, can you blow a hole in the wall?"

She looked at him in surprise, but nodded, aimed her umbrella and released a barrage of bullets. They bounced off the nearest wall and ricocheted dangerously close.

"Don't kill us!" Shinpachi shouted, diving to the floor next to Gintoki with his arms over his head.

"Uh oh," Kagura said. "It didn't work."

"We know that!" Shinpachi yelled. "What's that wall made out of, anyway?"

"Titanium," a man's voice answered.

A massive Amanto who looked like a cross between a hyena and a gorilla stepped out of the shadows. He was cradling a nasty-looking flame-thrower.

Other Amanto appeared around him. Gintoki didn't like the grins they were wearing.

"There's a price on your head, samurai," the Amanto said. "We haven't forgotten the Amanto you slaughtered during the war."

"Don't make it sound like they were vacationers or something," Gintoki said, standing up. He was damned if he was going to die lying on the floor of a warehouse. "They tried to kill me, too."

"Titanium? The whole warehouse?" Shinpachi stood, too. "That must have cost a fortune!"

"It did," the Amanto replied. "And it's been worth every penny. All of the crates you see around you hold enough weapons and bombs to destroy Edo ten times over."

"But why would you want to destroy Edo?" Shinpachi said, his eyes wide. "You're Amanto!"

"Call it 'negotiations,'" the Amanto said.

"Call it NEVER HAPPENING!" Gintoki shouted. He leapt forward.

The Amanto evaded Gintoki easily and dropped the flamethrower to the ground. He pulled a wicked-looking double-edged sword and faced Gintoki with a smirk.

"You're too slow," he taunted.

Gintoki could hear Shinpachi yelling and the clash of wood against metal, while Kagura's umbrella was spewing bullets at a clip that let Gintoki know that there were way too many pirates for them to handle on their own. He wiped his brow with his arm, keeping his sword ready. They were screwed, especially since he'd missed the leader in his first, strongest rush. But going on the defensive meant death.

He rushed the Amanto again.

This time their swords crashed together, Gintoki just managing to hold his ground under the Amanto's heavy swing. He parried and slashed, feeling a vicious sense of accomplishment when he laid open the Amanto's cheek.

The Amanto put a hand to his face; it came away green, covered in blood. He grinned and licked the blood from his fingers. Gintoki feinted and whirled, bringing his sword up instead of slashing down. He realized his mistake even as the sword arced through empty air – he'd had to come in too close, well within the Amanto's greater reach. Even as he began to twist to meet the blade he could sense coming from below, the tip entered his gut in exactly the same place he'd already been wounded and ripped through him.

Gintoki stumbled. The Amanto's sword bit deep into his lower back this time, and Gintoki could feel himself falling, his legs numb and unresponsive.

His elbow hit the ground first, knocking his sword from his grip and sending mind-numbing pain through his body, already overwhelmed by the fire in his gut. He felt the cold concrete of the warehouse floor under his cheek and frantically tried to make his body respond to his commands. With grim detachment, he felt the Amanto leader grab his hair and pull his head from the floor. "This will be a pretty prize," the Amanto gloated. "The head of the great Shiroyasha!" The pirate raised a curved knife over his head and brought it down—

–And the knife clattered to the warehouse floor as the Amanto fell in two neatly equal halves, split down the middle from his head to his feet. One half fell on Gintoki, pouring blood and gore and smelling of bowel contents. Even half of the Amanto's weight was still crushing, and Gintoki cursed as the corpse threatened to smother him.

"Don't you dare die here, you bastard," a low voice said angrily.

"You're a hundred years too early to see me die," Gintoki tried to say, but nothing really came out other than a groan. He felt the Amanto's body rock, then the weight was off of him and he could pull air into his lungs in great gulping breaths while Hijikata held his head out of the pool of blood and guts he'd been lying in.

"Fuck," Hijikata said. He began to pull at Gintoki's kimono.

Gintoki was having a hard time focusing on him; it was as if Hijikata was fading in and out. "Are you a ghost?" he asked. "I really hate ghosts."

"Shut the fuck up."

"Oh, no, I get it." Gintoki grinned as Hijikata stripped him. "Can't get enough of me, hey?"

"I said shut the fuck up!" Hijikata pressed his hand hard into Gintoki's stomach.

"Oh, shit," Gintoki gasped. "Ohthathurts—"

"KONDO!" Hijikata bellowed. "CALL FOR AN AMBULANCE!"

No matter how hard he tried, Gintoki couldn't seem to catch his breath through the pain. "Hey," he wheezed. He needed to tell Hijikata something, but whatever it was danced at the edges of his mind, just out of reach.

"If you die, I'm going to kill you, you son of a bitch!" Hijikata hissed. He seemed to be pressing harder, but it didn't hurt nearly as much as it had at first.

Now he remembered. "You kiss good, you know," Gintoki whispered. "I like kissing you."

A huge form loomed in the fading light. "An ambulance is coming, Toshi! Oh hell. Is that the Yorozuya?"

"He can't wait much longer. Hold his insides in while I carry him out of the line of fire," Hijikata said.

Gintoki felt hands slide under him, strong arms cradle him. "Neko-chan," he whispered, smiling. Then the arms heaved and the pain skyrocketed and everything went very, very dark.

oOoOoOo

The first couple of days of his hospital stay were pretty hazy.

Shinpachi and Kagura had given him strange looks and told him how Hijikata had refused to leave Gintoki's side as they'd loaded him into the ambulance, and how he'd bullied the hospital staff to take Gintoki into the operating room when the doctors had said it was no use, and later got the nurses to allow Shinpachi and Kagura to sit with Gintoki when he'd eventually been sent to Recovery to be hooked up to massive machines that ate and breathed and pissed for him.

As far as Gintoki was concerned, it was all hearsay. Hijikata hadn't turned up at the hospital once after he'd awoken from surgery.

Luckily, the job hadn't been a complete waste. The shopkeeper who had hired them actually paid them, and Kagura had intimidated him into giving them 'danger' money to compensate for Gintoki's injuries.

Gintoki approved, even though Shinpachi had pointed out that they hadn't actually finished the job they'd been given. But then Kagura had pointed out that they'd been eating rice with raw egg and soy sauce for nearly a month, and Shinpachi had shut up pretty quickly. And then Gintoki pointed out that they wouldn't have received the money at all except for his heroism, so rightfully the money was his. And then Shinpachi and Kagura had both pointed out that he wasn't a hero, he was just really, really stupid, so they deserved the money as compensation for working with an idiot. The ensuing fight went a long way towards making Gintoki feel healthier. Life just wasn't quite as fun without people to fight with.

Hasegawa dropped by the hospital quite a bit while Gintoki was recovering, which was nice, since Gintoki always ended up feeling like he'd got a better deal in life than Hasegawa had, which was cheering, though Shinpachi told him it was actually pretty twisted.

On the philosophy that a windfall wasn't really a windfall until it was being spent, as soon as Gintoki had been out of the hospital for a couple of weeks and was semi-mobile, he and Hasegawa hit Edo. They started at a hostess club until they were kicked out for lewd and drunken behavior, then moved on to pachinko until Hasegawa caught Gintoki feeding coins into a vending machine and shouting at it to give him more balls. After that, things got a little hazy. Gintoki vaguely remembered paying somebody something for Hasegawa, who disappeared with (Gintoki suspected) a prostitute, though by that time they were both so drunk that Gintoki doubted that Hasegawa had got his money's worth.

oOoOoOo

Two days later, Gintoki was mostly recovered and busy blowing the rest of the money on an ice cream parfait binge in the rebuilt restaurant where the whole kidnapping mess had started.

The venue for his binge had nothing to do with the fact that he hadn't seen Hijikata in weeks, or the off chance that he might show up there. Because if Hijikata did show up, it would be one of those cosmic coincidence things, or a returning to the scene of the crime thing.

It wouldn't have anything to do with Gintoki at all.

He waved at the waitress. "Another parfait!" he shouted.

"You're binging," Kagura said, slurping up noodles.

The waitress gave Gintoki his parfait and hurried away. "You've been watching 'Tell Ba-Chan Your Problems' again, haven't you?" Gintoki asked as he slid his empty parfait glass to the side and pulled the new one into the field of battle. "Besides, I've only had two parfaits."

"This one's your third."

"You've had _seven_ bowls of noodles."

"I'm a growing child." Kagura slurped more noodles.

"You're a bottomless pit."

Kagura said, "If you binge, it means you're sexually frustrated."

He nearly sprayed ice cream all over the table. "Where did you hear that? Who told you that? What do you mean by that?"

"Ba-Chan says so. It means that your dick is always limp, so your tongue has sex instead."

"That's not true! My dick is never limp! It's always hard and manly and ready to go!"

Gintoki suddenly realized that the restaurant had gone silent. "What?" he demanded, looking around at the sea of staring faces. "You don't believe me? I'll do any willing woman, right here, right now, to prove it!"

No women leapt to take advantage of his generous offer. Instead, the waitress brought another parfait and set it in front of him.

Gintoki blinked at it.

"On the house," she said, and walked away.

The floorshow finished, the other people in the restaurant calmly returned to their lunches and the buzz of conversation picked up where it had left off.

Gintoki stared at the new parfait.

"You really need to get laid, you disgusting pervert." Kagura slurped more noodles. "These are really good. Can I have more?"

As Gintoki opened his mouth to yell at her, a flash of movement caught his gaze. He watched through the window as a man dressed in black, a sword hanging at his side, leaned against a building across the street and stared back at him, surrounded by a wreath of cigarette smoke.

Finally. Maybe things could get back to normal, now. It was easier to hate someone when you could see them, after all.

Gintoki shut his mouth and viciously attacked his new parfait.

oOoOoOo

It was pouring.

No. It was not simply pouring. It was bucketing. It was _deluging_. Gintoki thought that all the gods in the heavens were probably crying so hard that they'd run out of tissues.

He grimly clutched his umbrella and hoped the plastic bag would keep his new _Jump_ and the chocolate sticks he'd just bought dry enough that the two didn't mix with catastrophic results. Preoccupied with getting home as quickly as possible, he was totally unprepared for a hand to reach out from an alleyway and pull him directly under a downspout.

"What the fuck?" he sputtered. The umbrella collapsed under the river of water pouring off the roof above him.

The unknown assailant slammed him into the wall. On the bright side of things, at least he wasn't under the waterfall anymore. On the not-so-bright side of things, he didn't have a fucking clue as to what was going on. He tensed in preparation to attack.

"It's payback time, Yorozuya."

"Hijikata?" Gintoki feigned surprise. "Oh, so you're still alive?"

A mouth crashed into his and a hard thigh shoved between his legs, and suddenly Gintoki couldn't care less about the rain or the broken umbrella or the bag with the _Jump_ in it that splashed into a puddle as he dropped everything to yank Hijikata close enough that he could comfortably rape his mouth. A low groan escaped Hijikata, and Gintoki could feel the hard press of Hijikata's arousal grinding into his hip.

"There are three things I hate: mayonnaise, smokers and a guy who humps me," Gintoki muttered into the kiss.

Hijikata responded by biting his mouth and spinning him around before pinning him to the alley wall again.

"Your ass is mine," he snarled into Gintoki's ear. "How many times have you fucked me? It's my turn now."

"What? All at once? That's got to be what, maybe two hundred times or so? I think you're bluffing."

"Does this feel like a bluff?"

Actually, Gintoki was pretty sure it felt like Little Hijikata, who he knew fairly intimately, though not from that particular perspective. "You planning to have sex with my clothes?"

"Pull 'em down. I want to see you, bare assed with legs spread."

Little Gintoki throbbed. He obviously got off on Hijikata's dirty talk. He loosened his belt, slid his trousers down around his knees and pulled his sodden kimono to the side.

Hijikata shoved him into the side of the building. "Against the wall."

"Public sex is generally hotter if there's public around," Gintoki pointed out helpfully. "Urg!" He tried to decide whether to kill Hijikata or cast Little Hijikata in gold and worship him. Worship won, and he spread his legs further. "Get going, would you?"

Of course, his order was a bit beside the point, since Hijikata was already going damned hard, but it never hurt to act like you were in control of the situation, even if you weren't because sweet heaven and earth Hijikata could move his hips like a guy who had never had girl-bits between his legs. Gintoki braced himself to keep Hijikata from giving him wall rash on his face and reached between his own legs to take things in hand.

The contrast between the cold rain and Hijikata's heat sent shivers down Gintoki's body. Hijikata's thrusts reached deep inside and found some happy place that made Gintoki groan and stand on his tiptoes, hoping that Hijikata would keep visiting if he opened the door as wide as he could to invite him in.

"You bastard," Hijikata panted into his ear, his breath floating clammy on the water-sodden air. "How come I can't hate you right?"

The world stopped and started again, and suddenly Gintoki could see things clearly, as if they'd been part of a negative before, but now the picture had developed. "You asshole," he said. "There's no right way to hate a person. Hate's wrong all the way through."

"Damn. I was afraid it was something like that. I'm going to come pretty soon. You ready?"

"Yeah."

Hijikata's hands felt like brands where they gripped his hips. Gintoki concentrated on the heat between them, the slap of their bodies coming together, the press of Hijikata's body against his, and then he was coming, and Hijikata was coming and then their legs gave out and they landed in the grimy water of an Edo alley puddle.

"Ouch."

"Fuck."

"My ass is going to freeze off," Gintoki observed.

"My little guy is the size of a pencil right now."

"We need dry clothes and hot sake."

"And a cigarette."

Gintoki squirmed into his soaked trousers and grimaced. "We're not far from my place, and Shinpachi and Kagura went out with Otae today to do some girly thing."

"Shinpachi, too?"

"He can't say not to Otae. He's got a sister-worship thing."

"His sister is scary."

"You're telling me. C'mon, Neko-chan." Gintoki hauled Hijikata to his feet and watched with interest as Hijikata tried to do up his complicated uniform, wishing it weren't raining quite so hard so he could see a little more detail. "If you want to walk there with your ass hanging out of your pants, it's fine with me."

Hijikata shot him a dirty look, finally managing to get all of his buttons done up.

"Come on," Gintoki said. "I know a short cut."

Within five minutes they were at the Yorozuya office, stripping out of their wet clothes and leaving them in puddling heaps on the entrance mat. Gintoki went into the bath and grabbed a couple of towels, sniffing them and deciding that they would do.

"Here," he said, coming out and tossing one to Hijikata, who caught it and wrinkled his nose. "My bedroom's over here."

"This towel is crunchy."

"It's just your imagination." Gintoki pulled the futon out of the closet and flopped it on the floor, then grabbed the blanket. "Here. Start getting it warm for us."

"How am I supposed to do that?"

"Roll up in it. Or set it on fire," Gintoki said, shivering. "It's fucking cold in here." He dug through the closet and found both pillows, though one looked suspiciously like Sadaharu had been using it as a chew toy. Still, it was soft and reasonably intact, and the slobber would be dry by now. "Here's a pillow. Oh, and here's my lube stash," he added, prying up the floorboard he hid his porn under.

The only tube left was half-empty. "Damn that Shinpachi," he muttered. "He's going to have to deal with it at some point in his life."

"You share lube?"

"Well, he's too embarrassed to buy it himself," Gintoki explained. "What? It's not creepy! It's not creepy, is it? Oh, fuck, it's creepy. I knew that if anyone ever found out it'd be creepy."

"It's creepy," Hijikata confirmed, "but I don't give a fuck. Give it here. I want to fuck you again."

"Use plenty," Gintoki said, already stroking himself in anticipation. "That spit-fuck chafed."

Hijikata grunted. "Bend over."

"That's about as sexy as it gets," Gintoki replied in disgust. "Look, you topped already. This time I'll sit on it."

"Works for me." Hijikata held Gintoki's hips steady as Gintoki straddled him. "Yes," he hissed as Gintoki gingerly lowered himself and encased him.

"Good, aren't I?" Gintoki felt pretty smug. "I've been shitting for years to build those muscles."

"Shut the fuck up if you're going to say things like that," Hijikata said, his hips echoing Gintoki's rhythm. "That's disgusting."

"Nothing's disgusting when you love someone." Gintoki grunted. "Yeah, that's the spot."

"I don't love you, moron."

"It feels to me like you love my asshole."

"It's passable," Hijikata grudgingly admitted. "It's the rest of you I hate."

"Didn't you tell me once that hate is just another kind of love?"

"I was whizzing at the time."

"Ah." Gintoki couldn't help but grin as Hijikata's frown grew fiercer. "I see."

"You see what?"

"When a man's little guy is hanging out, you can't believe a word he says."

"That's right."

Gintoki rooted in his ear innocently, rolling smoothly with Hijikata's movements. "Like that time when your little guy was hanging out in front of all of those Amanto and you told them that you were going to kill them."

"Death threats don't count. They're always true, little guy hanging out or not."

"Or when you squealed like a girl when Sakamoto burst in on us." He blew a bit of imaginary earwax off his finger and rotated his hips, making Hijikata gasp.

"I've never squealed in my life," Hijikata said, his voice strained. "Do that again."

"Or just tonight, when you said you wanted my ass."

"Revenge doesn't count, either."

Gintoki decided to go for the kill.

"Urk!"

"Mmm." Gintoki flexed his inner muscles again. "So I suppose that if I stood up and you fell out and I asked you if you wanted to keep fucking me and you said 'yes.' you'd be lying?"

"Bastard!" Hijikata pulled him down. "Shit, that feels good…"

"Me, too. Fuck. I'm almost there—"

"Gintoki! Gintoki! Are you home?"

Kagura burst into the room.

"What the fuck?" Hijikata screamed. He pushed Gintoki, who fell to the side.

"Uh, ha ha, hi, Kagura," Gintoki said, frozen in shock and very, very aware that Little Gintoki was currently pretty hard and red and visible. "Why don't you go outside for a little while and let Gin-chan get dressed, okay, sweetie?" Without waiting for a reply, he yanked the blanket from Hijikata and dove back into the bed.

"Are you having gay sex?" Kagura demanded. "Because it looks a lot like your pervert movies in here."

"Hahaha. This isn't gay sex, honey," Gintoki said, trying to sound like he wasn't shaking like a leaf. "Hijikata-san is just a stalker, like Kondo-san."

"I'm not a fucking stalker," Hijikata said furiously. "Sakata was doing perverted things, and I came here to arrest him."

"If this isn't gay sex, Ba-Chan needs a new dictionary," Kagura replied. "Hey! Shinpachi! C'mere!"

Shinpachi poked his head in the room. "What is it, Kagura? Has something happened to Gin-san?"

Kagura pointed. "Oi! Does this look like gay sex to you?"

Shinpachi screamed.

Otae stormed in. "Did somebody say Gintoki has a stalker? What? Are the producers trying to write me out of the script or something? Aren't I the only one with a stalker on this anime?"

Gintoki cowered. "No! No! I was just joking!"

"Hijikata-san is in your bed and he's naked," Otae pointed out. "Kondo does that at least once a week. If you're trying to get me sacked—"

"No! Never! Get out, shoo, go away!" Gintoki frantically flapped his hands at Hijikata. "He's not a stalker! He's just a TV repair guy!"

"You mean he's gay?"

"I'm not fucking gay!"

"Hostesses are experts. We know who's gay and who isn't," Otae said. "You're gay."

"Who's gay?" Okita asked from the doorway.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Hijikata demanded, going absolutely white.

"We gave 'em a ride home since it was raining," Okita said. "I would have let them walk, but Kondo-san insisted." He stared at them dispassionately. "Say, Hijikata. I hear you get kicked out of the Shinsengumi if you're gay."

"I'm not gay!"

"Huh. Looks like I need a new dictionary."

"Sougo? Sougo!"

"In here, Kondo-san."

"You little bastard!" Hijikata hissed. He tried to pull the blankets over his head.

Kondo peered around the corner. "Sougo, what are you doing in the Yorozuya's bedroom?" His eyes suddenly bulged. "Toshi!"

Hijikata groaned. "Too late." He pulled the blanket over his head anyway.

Gintoki gave Kondo a sickly grin. "You see, it was raining and we got wet—"

"Toshi, what are you doing in the Yorozuya's bed?"

"He's hiding. But he was fucking the Boss when I walked in," Okita supplied helpfully.

"We were NOT fucking when you walked in!" the blanket shouted.

"No, they were fucking when I walked in," Kagura said. "Stop lying, jerk."

Kondo seemed to be having a hard time understanding. "But you're – he's – you're both—you're gay?"

"I'm not gay!" the blanket shouted.

"I need a new dictionary," Kondo said, sounding dazed. He fainted.

Otae kicked him. "Oops." She smiled cheerfully.

"Hey, Gintoki," Hasegawa suddenly popped his head in the door. "It's raining like hell out there and my box is soggy. Can I sleep here…" He looked around. "Uh. Is this an orgy?"

"Gintoki and Hijikata-san are having sex," Shinpachi explained.

Kagura made gagging noises that were disgustingly realistic. "Haven't I told you not to do that unless you want to clean up everybody's puke?" Gintoki yelled.

"Wait. Gintoki… You're gay?" Hasegawa looked panicked. "Are you after my ass?"

"Holy fuck no!" Gintoki yelled, aghast.

"What? Isn't it good enough for you? Or do I have a loser ass, too?"

"No, your ass isn't a loser," Gintoki backpedaled. "Er, it's just not my—"

"That's the story of my fucking life," Hasegawa said. "I'm just not anybody's."

"Loser," Kagura said.

"Kagura, that's not nice, even if it's true," Shinpachi said.

"I AM NOT GAY!" Gintoki shouted.

"Then I need a new dictionary," Hasegawa replied.

"Loser," Kagura said again.

"What's all the noise in here! It's in the middle of the day, for cripe's sake!" Otose stormed into the room, closely followed by Catherine and Tama.

"Oh, look, Otose," Catherine said, pointing. "The pervert is doing disgusting things. Throw him out and give me his apartment."

"I'm not doing disgusting things," Gintoki protested. "Right, Hijikata?"

The blanket groaned.

"See?" Gintoki said. "He agrees."

"May I watch?" Tama said. "I would like to gather data about homosexual male mating habits."

"I keep telling you, I'm not gay! Why doesn't anybody believe me?"

"It might have something to do with having sex with Hijikata-san, Gin-san," Shinpachi pointed out.

"Is Otae here?" someone called from the living room. "She wasn't at the dojo when I stopped by."

"Come in, Kyubei!" Otae said cheerfully.

"NO! DON'T COME IN!"

"Hello, Otae." Kyubei fixed her disapproving gaze on Gintoki. "I know that you're a layabout, but isn't it a bit much to lie around naked and make others come to your bedroom instead of dressing and entertaining your guests in the living room like a civilized person?"

"He was having sex with Toshi," Kondo explained.

"Augh!" the blanket said.

"I always thought you were gay," Kyubei said.

"Take that back!" Gintoki demanded.

"I heard that Gintoki was poorly," another all-too-familiar voice said.

Gintoki panicked. "What? Did someone say there were SHINSENGUMI IN THE ROOM?"

Zura walked in, followed by Elizabeth. "I didn't say any such thing. But I brought grapes."

Gintoki prayed. At least Zura had had the sense to wear his pirate outfit.

"He nearly got killed, but that was a while ago," Shinpachi said. "At least six episodes."

"I see. In that case, I'll take the grapes home with me. Come, Elizabeth." Zura turned to leave.

Kondo stared at Zura. It was obvious that a thought was forming in his head. "Zura!" Gintoki stage-whispered, shooing frantically. "Get the hell out of here!"

"My name's not Zura. It's Space Captain Katsura."

"Wait!" Kondo cried. "Aren't you the wanted Joui rebel, Katsura Kotaro?"

"No relation."

Elizabeth held up a sign. _The resemblance is misleading_.

"I see," Kondo said, nodding. "Sorry. My mistake."

Elizabeth's sign flipped. _Are they gay?_

"It would appear so, Elizabeth," Katsura said gravely.

"I'm not gay!" Gintoki yelled.

"I beg your pardon," Zura said. He turned to Elizabeth. "The socially acceptable term is 'homosexual', Elizabeth."

_Homosexual: of, relating to, or characterized by a tendency to direct sexual desire toward another of the same sex._

"That's correct."

"That's not correct! That's not correct! Stop saying that's correct!"

_I need a new dictionary._

"We'll purchase one on the way back home," Zura said reassuringly. "I understand that there's a rainbow bookstore three blocks from here. I'm sure that they'll have the most up-to-date references regarding men having sex with other men."

"We're not men having sex with other men!" Gintoki shouted. "We're just men having sex! No other men are involved!"

"He's right," Otose said, blowing smoke. "Two men in an anime or manga having sex with each other is simply fan service."

Gintoki heaved a sigh of relief, echoed by the blanket.

"It's only gay if one of them was a virgin with cat ears that he subsequently lost," she continued.

The blanket screamed.

"Getoutgetoutgetout!" Gintoki tried to pull the blanket around his waist and leap to his feet to push them out of the room, but the blanket rebelled, and he found himself naked in front of ten people, a robot and a thing, whatever the hell Elizabeth was.

Catherine curled her lip. "Disgusting."

"Bacteria are swarming all over his testicles," Tama observed.

"No wonder I never hear any women up here," Otase said.

"That's not all the bigger it gets, is it? Is it? Gin-san, men get bigger as they get older, don't they? Don't they?"

Shinpachi's panic threatened to develop into hysteria. Gintoki needed to shut him up, but the only way he could think to do it was to demonstrate that yes, men got bigger when they got older, and he didn't think that was the smartest move at the moment, especially with Otae in the room.

"I don't see why that's so important," Kyubei said, shaking her head. "It's hardly impressive."

"It isn't," Otae reassured her. "They simply like to think it is."

"Mine's important!" Hasegawa protested. "More important than that, anyway."

"Oi," Gintoki said, annoyed. "That's the last time I'm paying for sex for you." Looking around at the shocked faces, he realized he probably shouldn't have said that. "What I mean is—"

"Shut the fuck up!" the blanket said. "And get them the hell out of here!"

"You heard the lump!" Gintoki stood in all his not-as-manly-as-usual pride. "Shut up and get out! It's like herding cats," he muttered under his breath as the last person left the room and he shut the door.

"Oi. Enough with the cat jokes." Hijikata poked his head out from under the blanket. "Are they gone?"

"Yeah." Gintoki climbed back into the futon and claimed his share of the blanket. "Now, where were we?"

"What the fuck?" Hijikata sputtered. "Are you crazy? They'll hear us!"

"No, it'll be fine, I promise—"

Shinpachi wandered back into the room, carrying something and frowning at it. "You'd better look at this, Gin-san. I don't know why this was in the bathroom, but we're going to get a lot of letters if it's for Kagura-chan."

"Can't it wait?"

"No. I really don't think it can."

Gintoki pulled the covers up higher. "But we're right in the middle of having—"

"This is prime time. You can't be doing that now, anyway," Shinpachi said dismissively. "You really, really need to look at this, Gin-san."

Hijikata grunted and started putting on a kimono.

"No! Wait! Stop!" Gintoki grabbed the kimono and tried to pull it away from Hijikata's hands. "I'm not done yet."

"I'm not letting you [bleep] me with a horny teenager in the room and a house full of people wandering in and out during prime broadcasting time." Hijikata calmly punched Gintoki in the face and finished dressing while Gintoki rolled on the futon holding his nose and moaning. "I need a smoke."

"Gin-san…" Shinpachi insisted.

"Right. I'll look at the damned thing, then," Gintoki said, still holding his nose. "You, stay. You can smoke in bed."

Hijikata rolled his eyes. "You're such a horny dog."

Gintoki ignored him and grabbed the item from Shinpachi. "Oi! This is a pregnancy testing kit!"

"My contract's good, so it's not mine," Hijikata said, sitting back down on the futon and lighting a cigarette. He took a deep drag. "Looks like a little sex education is in store for the China brat."

"I'm not a China brat, I'm a Yato brat. Why is that creep smoking in your bed? Didn't you tell me that I can't have fires in bed?" Kagura asked, wandering in, followed by Sadaharu. "Hey! What's that?"

"Something you should never see," Gintoki said sternly, hiding the kit behind his back.

"It's a kit for testing whether or not you're pregnant," Shinpachi explained. "Girls use them after they have unprotected sex."

"Oi! Oi! Oi!" Gintoki sprang up and clamped his hand over Shinpachi's mouth. "He's lying, Kagura. This is a kit for testing for acid rain. The producers want to go on an environmental awareness kick, that's all. Ah ha ha ha. Acid rain. You know. Testing."

"Lame," Hijikata said, blowing out a stream of smoke.

Shinpachi yanked Gintoki's hand away from his mouth and glared. "I'm not lying! She's going to have to learn about it someday, isn't she?"

"But not during prime time! Not when I want to get laid!"

"Oi, you two stop arguing," Kagura said. "You're disgusting. Besides," she said, plopping down at the end of the futon and sticking her finger up her nose, "I know all about that stuff. I made sure that my contract says that I can have lots of sex without getting pregnant once I'm sixteen. There'll still be plenty of lolichan left in me then, so we can draw in the hentai crowd."

"OI!" Shinpachi shouted. "WHY DOESN'T MY CONTRACT SAY THAT? Not the pregnancy part, of course," he added hastily. "I got the standard no mpreg clause put in for that. But I'm sixteen already! I WANT A CLAUSE THAT LETS ME HAVE LOTS OF SEX!"

"Maybe it's your sister's kit? It can't be the crone's, and the thought of Catherine having sex is just—" Gintoki shivered.

"The only one who can make Otae pregnant is me," Kondo protested, sticking his head in the room. It immediately began spouting blood, and he fell to the floor with a dazed look and crosses for eyes.

"I have the standard 'no pregnancy' clause, too," Otae said, walking into the room and smiling cheerfully while wiping the blood from the hammer she held.

"Besides, Otae is mine," Kyubei added, following Otae and glaring.

"I want to watch that," Gintoki said. "If you want to show me how you two do it together, you can both stay. The rest of you, get out."

"In fact," Otae went on, ignoring Gintoki, "I happen to know that everyone got the standard 'no pregnancy/no male pregnancy' clause. The studio made the director do it because they didn't trust him. It was part of the conditions that were set for being allowed to come back from the fringe time slot they'd given us two years ago."

"His contract doesn't," Hijikata said, jerking his head at Gintoki.

All eyes in the room focused on Gintoki.

"A loophole?" Shinpachi looked stunned. "They left a loophole?"

"What?" Gintoki demanded. "So I didn't get the damned clause put in! I'm the main character! The main character never gets pregnant. It makes him less attractive and the viewers stop watching!"

"A huge loophole," Otae agreed. Kyubei nodded gravely.

"GarGANtuan loophole," Kagura said, looking at her finger before wiping it on Gintoki's sheets.

"ENORmous loophole," Kondo said weakly from the floor.

"No! No! They wouldn't do that! That's just too—too—"

"They could pull in the middle-aged married women demographic with that," Otose observed from the doorway.

"Yeah. And a lot of the single straight women, too. Male preg slash is hot," Catherine said. "And it's fun to laugh at pregnant men. They're idiots."

"That's just disgusting!" Gintoki sputtered. Hijikata started to laugh. "What are you laughing at, neko-boy!"

"We just did it," Hijikata chuckled. "Twice."

The closet door opened and Okita stepped out, dropping his bazooka from the firing position. "Did I just hear Hijikata-san say he knocked up the Boss?"

"Oi!" Hijikata protested. "What the hell were you doing in the closet?"

"Target practice," Okita said vaguely. "Do you think that the brat will have black hair or white hair?"

"THERE IS NO BRAT!" Gintoki bellowed. "NOW GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY ROOM!"

"I've always wanted to learn how to knit," Otae said cheerfully.

"Can I be the godfather?" Shinpachi asked eagerly. Then his face fell. "Wait. Then I'd be a father and still wouldn't have ever had sex."

"I'll be the godfather," Kagura volunteered. "I'll have plenty of sex, so it'll be okay."

"But you're a girl!"

"So what? So's Kyubei!"

"Kyubei has nothing to do with being a godfather!"

"Arf! Arf!" Sadaharu argued.

"You're right, Sadaharu. We can both be the godfather," Kagura said, patting him. Sadaharu's tongue lolled happily.

"GET THE HELL OUT!"

The crowd drifted from the room, debating whether the kid would be a lazy bum or psychotic, Okita already laying odds while money passed from hand to hand. Otose paused, her hand on the door.

"If you put a nursery in, I'm charging extra rent."

She slid the door shut.

Gintoki grabbed the hammer that Otae had left behind. "You get out, too!" He threw the hammer at the ceiling.

Sarutobi tumbled down.

"Gintoki, darling, is it the penis? I can get a penis!" Sarutobi wailed. "I can get two penises! You can make me wear tight cock rings on them both!"

"He likes cat ears along with them," Hijikata told her. "And a tail."

"I can get all that!"

Gintoki grabbed her, slid the door open, threw her out and then slammed the door closed again in one practiced motion. He whirled and pointed a finger at Hijikata. "It's not funny! Stop with the joke already!"

"What joke?" Hijikata looked entirely too pleased as he lit another cigarette.

"When did you pick it up?"

"I'm telling you, I didn't have anything to do with the pregnancy kit. You'd be better off talking to your agent." He nodded his head at the box. "Want a little privacy?"

"I'm not pregnant!" Gintoki protested.

"I hope they make you heaviest during the really hot part of summer." Hijikata let his cigarette smolder in his fingers as a smirk played across his lips. "You sweat like a pig."

"Oh, shit." Gintoki slumped down on the futon. "Why didn't anybody tell me about the 'no male pregnancy' clause?"

"Because you're old enough to have thought of it yourself, maybe?" Gintoki buried his face in his hands, and after a couple of moments, Hijikata sighed. "Look. You're not in this alone, okay?"

"You're not the one who's going to be pregnant," Gintoki retorted.

"No, I'm the one who knocked you up." Hijikata frowned. "Unless…?"

"No!" Gintoki said, horrified. "Only you! Who else do you think I'd let near my ass? Well, what other guy, I mean," he clarified.

"That's what I thought." Hijikata sounded unbearably smug. "I make enough to help pay the extra rent for the brat. Don't worry."

"Hey, Gintoki! Get your ass out here!" Hasegawa's voice came through the doorway. "You can't have booze anymore, but I got you some sparkling plum cider to celebrate!"

Gintoki could hear the television playing and drunken voices singing _Kato Ken Samba_. It sounded like everyone was having fun. "But I wanted more sex," he protested weakly.

"We'll have more later." Hijikata stood, pulled Gintoki to his feet and handed him a robe. "Don't worry, I'll drink enough for two."

"Better make that three," Gintoki said, absently donning the robe. No sake for— "Hey. Do male anime pregnancies have to last a whole nine months? Do you think we could talk them into making it a two or three episode arc instead? That wouldn't be so bad."

"We'll find out," Hijikata said. He slid the door open to pandemonium and cheers. "Come on, princess. There's a party waiting for us."

Gintoki brightened. A party, then sex. Lots of sex. "I want to have enough sex to make up for not being able to see my toes," he said, putting a possessive hand on Hijikata's ass.

"Yeah, yeah. If you can keep it up, loser."

"I'm always up. I'm like a legend that way," Gintoki said. He steered Hijikata out of the bedroom amid jeers and wolf whistles.

"We'll see if you can put Little Gintoki where your mouth is," Hijikata murmured as the others clapped and danced around them. "Later, jerk!"

Gintoki just smiled and dragged Hijikata into the dance line. It was too bad that Hijikata didn't have the tail any longer.

He'd have looked hot doing the samba with it.

_**fin**_


End file.
